Dungeons and Dalliances

Showing up to class a half-hour later and seeing Camille there, Natalie almost couldn’t resist the urge to storm up and confront her. Except, she really couldn’t tell whether she’d been reading into it. And if Camille had been the one who caught her, then, by the simple fact she hadn’t tried to blackmail her yet, Natalie supposed she ought to be happy about things.

Though, ‘yet’ might be the operative word there.

The best case scenario was Camille simply liked seeing Natalie squirm. Which wasn’t a great thing for her state of mind, but for her reputation at Tenet? Again, a rumor spreading that Natalie liked to summon illusions of her magic tutors and jerk off, loudly, in the public bathroom—that wouldn’t paint her in the greatest light. To say the least.

Had she seriously done that? If she could go back in time and strangle herself, she would.

“What is it?” Jordan asked.

Natalie jumped. She realized she’d been staring. “Uh. Nothing.”

By Jordan’s quirked eyebrow, she’d made a few assumptions about why Natalie had been staring at Camille. Not wholly unfair ones. If the dark-haired woman wasn’t the subject of Natalie’s anxiety, then she’d happily admit just how much her classmate had going on.

Was it better or worse that such an attractive girl had been the one to catch her?

Had she liked what she’d seen?

Okay. That was the problem in the first place. Keep it in your pants, Nat.

“Gather around,” Instructor Robin’s voice rang through the sparring room. “Some quick announcements before we get started, today.”

The sixteen students formed up in a semi-organized half circle. Like usual, Instructor Robin had arrived exactly on the dot, just as the bell rang.

“I’ll get straight to things. First, I want to straighten out how the ranking system will work. It’s better you know before it’s official.”

She spoke with a quick, impatient tone, wanting to deliver the information and be done with it. Instructor Robin had made it clear she enjoyed her job, the training of a new generation of delvers, but her dislike of her peripheral duties was equally clear.

“I’m sure everyone knows, by now, that Tenet will be ranking each of you across a variety of fields. Most critically, combat performance, academics, and delving. But let me ensure there’s no misunderstanding. The first comes from official bouts and evaluated competitions, not our practices. Feel free to experiment and do poorly in my class. It’s one of the few places you can do so without overmuch worry of injury.”

Natalie found herself passively nodding along. She’d discovered why, despite the brutal intensity expected from Tenet students during spars, so few left the ring with life threatening injuries. Besides hitpoints—which weren’t a panacea, merely a mitigator—it was the faculty.

Though Instructor Robin was no top ranker, she was a retired high-ranker. Likely the lower end of high, true, but a ‘lower end’ high ranker was still a position most delvers never managed. It meant she had astoundingly enhanced senses, and an equivalent ability to act on them. Several times, Natalie had seen the woman halt one of her student’s strikes and spare a gruesome injury. She moved like a viper. Made them seem clumsy in comparison.

“And beyond that, evaluations for rankings won’t begin until two weeks from now. That includes dungeon performance. This initial period is for finding your feet, finding teams, experimentation of all kind. A luxury you won’t be afforded in the near future, so savor it while you can.”

Natalie found herself biting down on a question. Not because she thought Instructor Robin was a woman intolerant of questions, but because she had a feeling it was something she should already know. Plus, no point in holding up the class. She’d ask Jordan in a second.

Instructor Robin surveyed the line of students, then nodded. “You two,” she said, gesturing at Camille and a boy Natalie had yet to learn the name of. “And you two. You’re up first. Get to it.”

Jordan was included in the second pair, which Natalie frowned at. There went the person she’d intended to ask her question to.

Lining up to watch the spar—the rapid bouts tended to rotate, to give breathing time to the combatants—Natalie considered her alternative. Sofia. She found she had idly wandered over to the white-haired girl’s side. That shouldn’t be odd, considering they were prospective teammates, but Natalie had spent the past several years avoiding Sofia. So it was definitely weird, even if it shouldn’t be.

She was just too … too … something. To be around. She messed with Natalie just by existing. Even now, that stupid, analyzing look on her face as she observed the spar. Why was it so irritating? And who the fuck thought it was okay to give her cheekbones like that? Natalie wanted to file a complaint with whatever deity had been in charge of Sofia. Several complaints. For varying reasons.

Blue eyes flicked to Natalie, catching her staring. Natalie narrowed her own. “Do you always have to come off as so perfect?”

She hadn’t meant to start something, wandering over to Sofia’s side, and when she instinctively had started something, it was supposed to be insulting. The question she’d asked, she realized a second too late, fell a few steps short of that.

“No,” Sofia said dryly. “It comes naturally.”

Natalie crossed her arms, making her lack of amusement clear. On anyone else, she would’ve figured the response stemmed from a sense of humor, but here, that wasn’t possible. Sofia didn’t have a sense of humor.

Which was good. It wouldn’t have been fair if she’d been both able to trounce Natalie in a fight, and be likable. It was necessary for Natalie’s world view for this girl to be annoying. To have some flaw. However much she seemed like it, she wasn’t perfect. She refused to believe it.

“How’s it work, anyway?” Natalie asked, finding, like always, her mind going on the fritz just by holding conversation with the girl. It was an unparalleled talent of Sofia’s. Supernaturally gifted, maybe.

“Pardon?”

‘Pardon’. And with that stupid little raise to her eyebrow? This girl was so aggravating. But Natalie was supposed to be playing nice with her, since she was her teammate for the short term, maybe even long term, so she cut off a retort.

“The ranking system for delving. How do they handle it? Specifically, I mean.”

“Perhaps if you didn’t sleep through all of class, yesterday,” she said, rolling her eyes, “you’d know. They covered it. Then again, I guess you wouldn’t be you if you had managed more than sixty consecutive minutes of focus.”

Natalie sneered in response.

Another roll of her eyes. Why was Sofia always so unaffected? She never rose up to Natalie’s goading. Like she didn’t think Natalie meant her taunts and snips. Like she saw through her, or something. As if there was anything to see through.

“Let’s see,” Sofia said, answering the question. “Dungeon rankings. It’s not that complicated.”