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It never ceases to amaze Olruggio the speed in which witch gossip spreads.
Even when he lived in the outside, he remembers the older witches in the village speaking of things happening in the Great Hall and across the peninsula in places he'd never heard of before. He'd never paid much attention to it all with being so dedicated to his magic and he thinks that might've been for the best.
Living within the Great Hall now, he sees the inner workings of the rumor mill more than he'd ever wanted to. Normally, it doesn't bother him; Olruggio isn't one to put much stake in little rumors or other's nonsensical opinions. After all, his best friend is the unfortunate victim of many rumors, false or otherwise, and he'd loathe to believe any of them over Qifrey any day.
The issue, however, is how quick witches are to spread the word the moment any small change happens there under the ocean. Which — of course — is how he finds himself in a predicament.
Qifrey's vision had been questionable at best and only worsening to the point that Olruggio pointed out his squinting enough to earn an annoyed huff and light backhand to his arm more than a few times. Eventually, Qifrey had gone to Beldaruit about it and had gone through the whole evaluation for his eyes, only to return deflated when he telling Olruggio he needs glasses.
The day Qifrey's glasses are ready for pick up is ultimately uneventful and Olruggio forgets about it until dinner rolls around and he heads over to meet up with Qifrey as promised. Like usual, Qifrey is waiting outside of his atelier.
He's fiddling with the edges of his cloak, hands never able to sit still for long. Qifrey is looking down at the brick path laid beneath his feet, but as he hears Olruggio approach, he looks up and Olruggio would be lying if he said his heart didn't skip a beat.
The glasses are thin-rimmed, round, and suit Qifrey more than he was expecting them to. They're hardly an addition, all things considered, but his eye seems to shine a little brighter under the clear lens. It's not until Qifrey shuffles awkwardly on his feet, mouth pressed into an unsure line, that Olruggio realizes that neither of them have said anything.
"Do they look weird?" Qifrey asks, fingers twisting tighter into his cloak. "Beldaruit told me they didn't but—"
"You look nice," Olruggio blurts out then immediately wishes for the brick underfoot to swallow him whole. "I mean, they look nice." He pretends he can't feel the back of his neck prickle with an embarrassed heat.
Qifrey's shoulders loosen, an almost bashful smile pulling at his mouth. One hand unravels from his cloak to carefully push the glasses up his nose slightly. "I'm glad."
To ignore how cute Qifrey looks then, all shy and unsure, Olruggio steps closer. Certain he won't say anything else without thinking, he asks, "So, you can see better now?"
"Mmhm," Qifrey hums. "It's kinda weird how clear things are now." He studies Olruggio for a long moment before leaning into his space. Olruggio makes a half step back before his stolen ribbon tassel bumps into him too. Qifrey's perpetually cold hand brushes his hair from his forehead. "You've got a little scar there." He taps the spot above his eyebrow.
Olruggio jolts a little from the contact, heart hammering in his chest from the proximity. Reflexively, he bats at Qifrey's hand and hopes that's a normal enough reaction. Qifrey doesn't seem to notice his plight as he laughs and skips off in the direction of the mess hall. He sounds free in a way he hasn't since they returned from the Tower.
Olruggio watches him for a moment, hand rubbing against the spot Qifrey had touched. He really does have it bad, doesn't he?
Later, he'd wish a little crush is the only problem he has.
The glasses are a small change, yet it seems like every witch under the ocean has heard about it the day after Qifrey gets them.
Now, Olruggio is no stranger to the whispers that have followed Qifrey around for as long as he's known him. He knows that no matter how much he hates the baseless rumors and generally horrible things that have been said about his best friend over the years, there is nothing he can do to stop it. Qifrey tries to not be bothered by it all, either attempting to block it out altogether or regarding the whispers with a cold detachment, but Olruggio has seen the way his expression tightens and his hands twitch at his sides when they pass someone who breaks into a barely hushed voice to their friends nearby.
So, when these whispers suddenly turn more positive, Olruggio isn't sure what to think.
He first hears it when they're sat in the dining hall. A group of girls around their age walk by giggling, eyes trained on Qifrey as they walk further down to their table. Olruggio is ready to defend him, eyes narrowed in a near glare, when he hears one of them say above the noise of the mess hall, "Oh, you're so right. He looks even cuter now." The group of them break into giggles.
Olruggio's brows knit, not having expected that of all things. He's known Qifrey has admirers since his first few weeks in the Great Hall, but to hear it expressed so plainly is surprising, especially when most of the witches their age view him rather negatively.
He should be glad the opinions surrounding Qifrey are turning for the better, yet it makes something deep within him coil up possessively.
And, of course, it doesn't stop there.
In the halls, various apprentices stare longer than normal, some in disgust as usual, but most in wonder. Olruggio hears a litany of compliments following Qifrey around — attractive, pretty, cute to name a few — and he truly does hate how easily some witches change their minds.
Even some of the older witches who once denounced Qifrey rather publicly for only having one eye and dubious origins have taken to calling him a dapper young lad with those rounded frames upon his face.
And somehow, the worst part of it all is that Olruggio can't find a single fault in any of these whispers because, at the heart of it, they're right. Qifrey looks rather charming with his glasses and Olruggio hates that he agrees with whatever adjectives other apprentices bestow upon his friend.
"You look ready to bite someone's head off," Alaira comments a few days into his compliment driven torture. She sits across from him at his and Qifrey's normal table in the dining hall, while the normal occupant is off on his weekly brunch with Beldaruit.
Olruggio huffs. "No, I don't."
Alaira eyes him in that knowing way of hers. "I wonder about that. Surely can't be about who everyone's new eye candy is."
His nose scrunches up. "Ew, don't call him that."
She laughs unapologetically. "Sorry, sorry. I think it's so funny."
"At least someone does," he mutters, taking a spoonful of his stew.
"Don't be that way, Olly," she says, patting his arm good naturedly. "It'll pass sooner than later and then you won't be so jealous anymore."
"I'm not—" He stops to think about it. Olruggio resists the urge to place his head in his hands and groan. She's right and he really doesn't want to admit it.
Then again, he obviously doesn't have to. Alaira has been aware of his feelings for longer than he'd like anyone to be, but she hasn't squealed on him, so he supposes it's fine.
Across from him, Alaira takes to tearing apart her roll. She's not even looking at him when she says, "I think it's cute how sweet you are on him."
Olruggio splutters, nearly chokes on his water he'd been sipping on. "What," he says once he stops coughing.
Alaira shrugs. "Just saying. And seeing how everybody else has their eye on him too, maybe you should say something to him," she advises.
Olruggio bites the inside of his cheek. He's not hungry anymore.
The thing Alaira had correctly identified as jealousy only worsens as each day passes. He knows Qifrey wouldn't give most people the time of day, especially after so many of them spent far too much time bad mouthing him and acting like he's a scourge among the rest of them. Yet, Olruggio worries sometimes.
Sure, the other apprentices haven't gone out exploring with Qifrey and seen the way his eye shines with awe at the sight of a wide open sky or a small herd of dragons. They haven't seen a genuine smile from him that makes the dimple in his right cheek pop, nor have they made him laugh so hard he cried. They'd never had his awful stew or held his hand through a passing rain storm. They hadn't saved his life, haven't promised him the world. And most certainly, they'd never swapped tassels with him.
And despite all of that being true, Olruggio can't help worrying that one day Qifrey will go off with one of their peers instead of him. Maybe one day Qifrey will realize he's not as much of a magic prodigy as everyone calls him, that he'll realize that Olruggio isn't as amazing as Qifrey thinks he is.
It's stupid given that he's Qifrey's only friend aside from Alaira and he knows that it's dumb; his mind simply likes to wander. And all of that is only being made worse the more apprentices make their interest in Qifrey known.
There had been plenty of teasing about their tassels once they returned from the Tower, yet somehow, none of that seems to have stuck around when it comes to any of the witches mooning over Qifrey.
Olruggio wishes all the apprentices with hearts in their eyes would see his ribbon tassel hanging from Qifrey's cap and get the idea already.
(When that thought first popped into his head, Olruggio was so thoroughly mortified by the very concept of staking claim — as if he even has the right to — that he couldn't look Qifrey in the eye for a few days. It doesn't make it any less true, though.)
And even now, sat in the library, Olruggio isn't free from any of it. He holds in a groan and suppresses an eye roll when an apprentice a few tables over says to his friend, "Just look how cool he is." It's made several times more obvious who they're talking about when the friend full body turns and blatantly stares in Qifrey's direction.
Qifrey is oblivious to it all, focused on his readings and diligently taking notes as he studies for their gradually approaching fourth test. He looks relaxed despite the sheer size of the books sat open in front of him, hand poised and elegant as he writes something else down. He looks entirely normal, not unlike any other time they've studied together at the same little table in the library. His easy beauty is hard to ignore, so much like the other two witches, Olruggio stares.
His eyes take their time tracing Qifrey's features, down his nose and across his cheekbones dotted with the lightest of freckles from their adventures. He pauses briefly at Qifrey's mouth, momentarily mesmerized by the way he's silently repeating what he's reading back to himself, a habit he has yet to grow out of. Before he can get too absorbed at staring at his lips, Olruggio looks back up at his glasses, how the gold of the frames is catching the light. It's then that he sees Qifrey's eye flick up in his direction under his lashes, fuller and longer than they have any reason being.
"Is there any particular reason you're staring so hard?" Qifrey asks, tone teasing rather than accusatory. He's already looking back down at his notes, finishing up whatever he'd been writing.
Olruggio sputters, not having expected to be caught. "I wasn't," he says, clearly lying. "Just zoned out." How long had he been staring for him to notice? He can feel the back of his neck warming.
Qifrey's brow raises. "Uh-huh," he says, clearly not believing him as he levels him with an unimpressed stare. "You've been zoning out for a while then. I don't think you've flipped a single page since we got here." To punctuate this, Qifrey flips the page of one of his books.
Olruggio looks down to find that Qifrey is right. He's still open to the same page he started with. That explains why it felt like he'd already known what he was reading when he was actually attempting to study. "I had a long night trying to finish something up," he says, which isn't fully a lie.
The all-nighter had been necessary and he did in fact sleep before meeting up with Qifrey; he'd just spent more time after finishing his request awake thinking about Qifrey and their promised meet up before he'd finally succumbed to sleep. He's functioned perfectly well on less than three clockmarks of sleep, so he thought he would be fine, but he hasn't been able to focus much at all lately. Olruggio doubts that has much to do with the lack of sleep, though.
The concern is easy to spot on Qifrey's face before he even scolds him. "I thought you weren't working on anything lately."
Olruggio shrugs. "It was last minute." His master had passed it along shortly after he'd returned to the atelier the night before with an apology about getting it to him so late.
Qifrey frowns and even then, he's beautiful. "You're not doing too much, are you, Olly?"
The warm fuzzies strike him then at the nickname. "You'd know if I was." Olruggio sighs, setting his head in his hand. Might as well attempt to study a little, right?
"I guess so." Qifrey looks unconvinced, eyeing him for another beat before he too returns to his reading.
Olruggio gets at least a few pages into his book before the words begin to jumble up in his head and stop making sense. He leans further into his hand, scrubbing at his eyes for a moment. He knows better than to push his luck and try to keep reading, so he turns his attention back to Qifrey.
Ever since they were kids and he'd first loaded Qifrey's arms with books, Qifrey had soaked in every bit of knowledge that he possibly could. His love for magic is plain to see for anyone looking close enough — even after everything it had taken from him — so Olruggio has no doubt he'll pass once their fourth test rolls around. They both will.
Then, they'll be full fledged witches, free to leave the boundaries of the Great Hall and live their lives to the fullest in the outside world. He's heard plenty of plans from Qifrey in regards to how he wants to fix up that old shepherd's place in Naakiwan Downs, of how he wants to maybe take on students of his own eventually.
Olruggio thinks himself to be lucky that Qifrey considers him to be part of it all without asking.
Though he's tuning out the background noise in the library, he recognizes the voice of the boy from before. The jealousy in him rises once more at the thought that someone like him could take Qifrey away. He thinks about what Alaira had told him, to tell Qifrey before someone else sweeps him away, but he can't. Even though he does like Qifrey an awful lot, he knows he can't take more than what's offered to him.
Olruggio likes their friendship, likes that they understand each other in a way Olruggio hasn't found in someone else before and likely never will again. He doesn't want to lose that when Qifrey doesn't feel the same and every interaction between them turns awkward. Yet, the thought of some other apprentice swooping in, someone who doesn't even see Qifrey for all he's worth, makes him want to curl up miserably.
Later, he'll blame his sleep addled brain for the way he slumps down to the table, his head pillowed on his upper arm, hand extended towards Qifrey. His fingers loosely hook around the tassel hanging over Qifrey's shoulder. Olruggio twirls it around his fingers and pretends he doesn't wonder what it would be like to play with Qifrey's hair instead.
The ribbon is as smooth as it always has been, though part of Olruggio thinks it's in far better shape than he could've kept it himself. So far in his own head, he hardly notices the way Qifrey pauses and stares at where his hand meets the ribbon.
"We'll always be together, right?" Olruggio asks, voice barely above a whisper.
Qifrey's expression looks pained for a split second, but Olruggio can't be sure when it shifts so quickly. "Are you really sure you're okay, Olly? Maybe we should stop studying for now."
Olruggio bites the inside of his cheek as he realizes just what he's doing. He drops the tassel and watches it sway gently back to Qifrey's shoulder. "It's nothing," he says, a small, stiff smile sent Qifrey's way. "Just didn't get enough sleep." He shifts to sit upright again. The look he's being given makes Olruggio want to hide away, as if Qifrey could see through him.
Neither of them speak for a moment.
Qifrey's hand goes to the ribbon tassel in his normal anxious fiddling way and even being sleep deprived, it's not lost on Olruggio that Qifrey is touching the exact spot he had been as his fingers twist and twist and twist. Under the table, Qifrey's boot bumps against his foot and stays there.
It's small, but Olruggio appreciates it nonetheless. He knows how finnicky Qifrey can be with touch, so he treasures each and every time Qifrey iniates it.
"Of course we'll always be together," Qifrey says, voice equally as quiet after enough time had passed that Olruggio considered taking it back altogether. "Anywhere you go, I'll go too."
The smile this time is far more real, a giddy little thing that Olruggio can't force down, same as the fluttering in his stomach. It's easy to return the sentiment. "I'll follow you anywhere, too, 'course." It's hardly a love confession, but it feels enough like one that he feels nervous about saying it so plainly.
Qifrey smiles back at him (and if he wasn't so tired, maybe he would see the way the corner of his lips twitch, or the way his hand squeezes the tassel tight). He self consciously pushes at the edge of his glasses to adjust them, eye flicking away briefly before landing once more on him.
Olruggio yawns into his hand and whatever private moment they had breaks.
"If you want to sleep, which you should — seriously, how much sleep did you even get last night? — we can leave," Qifrey says pointedly, grasping at his pen once again.
They haven't been able to hang out much these days, pulled away by lessons or commissions or something or another, and Olruggio likes to think he's not the only one that's noticed. He's been looking forward to spending any time with Qifrey that he can, studying or not. He's not about to let himself lose this over being a little sleep. "I can sleep later."
In fact, a spell pops into his head and he eagerly scribbles it down on his paper to try out with spell casting ink later. Maybe his mind is clearer now with a little less jealousy clouding it. After all, there isn't anyone else Qifrey would promise to keep around so closely, right? He doesn't let that line of thinking for much further than that.
Across from him, Qifrey huffs fondly and Olruggio doesn't have to look at him to know he's rolling his eye at him.