Repartee [.alanna.]

Once again, Felix was up to his old tricks. If he had to pick a favorite character from any of Shakespeare's works, it would be Puck. He peered out from behind a rose bush as his manifold deceptions came to fruition. Amid the thin veneer of the fallen leaves blown to this spot from the forest, the lovers met.

It wasn't a happy meeting. In fact, it was like a scene from a terrible soap opera. She accused him of cheating, he denied adamantly, and she stopped his denials with a firm slap to the face. Felix, meanwhile, watched all of it with a sort of detached glee. The girl stomped off and the boy rubbed his cheek in bewildered silence. He sat on a bench to, Felix assumed, put together the pieces.

A couple minutes into this, a third party arrived. She shuffled through the leaves with a hopeful light shining through her normally painfully-shy face. The boy looked up at her when the sound of the leaves crackling under her feet caught his attention. She was clutching a note to her chest.

A bit of prearranged dialogue later, and they were leaving the garden together. Felix smirked to himself, emerging from behind the rose bush. Phase one of his plan was complete. Over the course of the next month, he planned on screwing up the order of that particular social group to the point where those that had been at the top were at the very bottom. To outsiders, it might seem vindictive, but none of them had directly insulted Felix. He was just bored.

He had been feeling the fall vibe when he got dressed that morning, but it helped that so much of his wardrobe fell into the earth tones category of colors. Besides his favorite jacket (the one whose coattails turned into wings when activated), he wore a fawn-colored button-up shirt whose cut was unique in that the buttons didn't divide the shirt symmetrically. His darker brown trousers were form-fitting to the point where he could encase his calves comfortably in riding boots.

Felix's hair was pulled back into a queue at the nape of his neck, tawny feathers and red beads contrasting with how pale it had gotten. Every month, it came closer to turning full silver. Felix didn't mind that too much; the repercussions for magic-using could be much worse.

He glanced upwards at the overcast sky. It promised rain, and he could feel the edges of the scar over his back twinge with the anticipation of it. Now that this display was over, his afternoon was looking mostly free. A long-fingered hand came up to stroke his bare jaw in contemplation.

Felix wasn’t the only one who had been watching the little scene play out. Kylar was there as well, and he had smelt something fishy shifting within this group. As someone on the top of the social food chain, Kylar could tell when change was being affected, when people started getting above themselves and the more worthy sank down too low. A shifting like this never happened naturally, someone had to be meddling in these people’s lives. But Kylar wasn’t the righteous sort, he wasn’t going to tell that person off or anything. He was just as bored, and that part of him found the whole situation somewhat amusing.

He was wearing black pants that fit him perfectly and a silvery button up with a black suit jacket over it, uniquely styled so the sleeves stopped and flipped up at his elbows. Kylar looked expensive as always and honestly a paper bag would look flattering on him, never mind the nice clothes. He was leaning against a tree, watching the drama play out with an amused sort of lift to his eyebrows, especially once the poor boy had been slapped. Served him right. Kylar knew he was a cheater, and that was only confirmed after he left with the other girl. Really, this school should have its own soap opera. Maybe one of those really bad ones in Spanish.

However, he had become aware of someone else watching as well. Hmm, could this be the person pulling the strings? Seemed likely, as he was the only other person here, and Kylar certainly would never bother to involve himself in that way. He might be kind of an ass sometimes, but Kylar wasn’t the type to go out of his way to do it. He walked over to the other person, his hands slung low in his pockets, casual as can be. Kylar walked with a certain quietness to his steps, like he just fit wherever his foot was placed. He looked over the guy quietly, deciding he did seem like an odd one, but couldn’t really gather much beyond that. “I think it’s going to rain,” Kylar said suddenly, announcing his presence behind Felix and looking up at the darkening sky. “Too bad, the day was just looking so happy too.” Kylar looked down at the other guy with a somewhat knowing look in his deep brown eyes. There was a mountain of subtext in everything he said and did not say, but the only clear thing was that he was curious. “I don’t believe we’ve met before,” Kylar said, his accent coming out unusually crisp. He held out his hand expectantly. “Kylar, and you are?” It felt strange introducing himself. Almost everyone knew who he was already.

Felix arched an eyebrow at the newcomer as he turned to see who was talking to him. The tall drink of water verified what Felix already knew of him; he was Kylar and he was somebody Felix had never tangled with before. What Felix knew was that the boy did not play games like those Felix did. His light reddish-brown eyes took in the other fellow, trying to gauge whether this meeting was just the thing to alleviate some of the impending boredom or just another needless distraction.

He didn't much care whether Kylar had heard of him before or not. He did have a reputation, but he did maintain enough secrecy that his reputation had to be fed on a regular basis for his name to carry any notoriety. "Felix," he replied as he took the other's hand and shook it once. "A pleasure."

In a moment, he'd sized up the fellow and found him to have the potential to be an interesting plaything, but currently rather normal. There was a reason he favored hanging out with Sandra, after all. This guy was obviously from a well-to-do family, based on the way he carried himself and his style of dress.Yet, Felix had also heard that the fellow had been at the school for a number of years. He probably relied on some charisma borne of good breeding and no small amount of good looks to carry him through social interactions.

And, based on his research into most of the student body, he knew that the guy was very adept at what he did with his powers. Felix pondered the potential outcomes of screwing with this guy's head. While his own abilities were nothing to scoff at, they were useless in a fight unless he specifically made something for combat.

With all that in mind, Felix felt he could reliably find Kylar's buttons and press them at will. He came from a similar background, after all, and had been ousted from it due to his unpredictable nature. "You don't enjoy a good storm? I find them cathartic. Revealing, even." He shrugged. "What brings you out to the gardens today? It can't possibly be the weather; it's been overcast for a while."

Hmm, so this was Felix. Kylar had heard the name around before, not always in conjunction with nice things. So he was a troublemaker after all, he had pegged it right earlier. Good, a little trouble would be far more interesting than anything else he could be doing at the moment. Even Kylar could only absorb himself in books for so long, and this was new company. He was so often tired of the crowd that gathered around him, a new face was welcome. Yes, Kylar would see how this interaction went.

“Revealing?” Kylar asked with a light laugh, sounding smooth and breezy to the ears. “Cathartic, that I’ve heard before, but revealing is a strange choice. What exactly do drops of water falling from the sky reveal?” Kylar smiled, clearly poking fun at Felix and the attempted deepness of his conversation. It wasn’t mean-spirited at all, and Felix would likely recognize the amusement in his eyes. And he thought Kylar would be a good plaything. He thought a similar feeling about Felix. “No, I don’t really care for storms,” Kylar answered him honestly, feeling there was no point in not talking about his feelings on the weather. Secrets were for people who had things to hide, and Kylar might have those, but disliking storms wasn’t one of them. “It’s the smell, more than anything. It just smells like worms.” His nose wrinkled briefly in disgust at the thought. Kylar didn’t care about getting wet, and the loudness certainly didn’t scare him, but having the whole outside smell like worms was just gross.

He just shrugged and smiled again, this one more slow and subtle. Kylar seemed to have a smile for every occasion, and hardly any of them were genuine. “Well, if you must know,” he said looking pointedly over at where all the drama had played out, “I had heard some people were pretty upset around here. I wanted to make sure nothing got out of hand.” Which wasn’t really the truth at all, but he wasn’t bothering to make it seem that way. What kind of a person would Kylar be if he just spilled his intentions to everyone he came across? “And what about you? Lurking behind trees isn’t really the normal way to enjoy a storm that hasn’t even happened yet,” Kylar asked Felix, his tone almost teasing. He knew Felix was up to something, and he was making it obvious he knew. Really, just to see what this guy would do about it, if anything. It was good entertainment, trying to figure people like him out.

Felix laughed, delighting that the other boy was perhaps overthinking his comment. "Yes, revealing," he explained patiently, "Almost everybody goes inside. You learn things about those who do not, and about those who do. When everybody is inside, they are forced into closer contact with each other and those interactions are fascinating." He shrugged, mostly because he didn't take himself seriously enough to get annoyed at the other boy's heavy-handed digs at their conversation.

He laughed again, this time at Kylar's rationale for disliking certain weather phenomena, "And how do you know what worms smell like?"

He doubted that Kylar was telling the truth about the reason for his being outside, but it didn't bother him in the slightest. Being secretive himself, he could read as much from the mistruth as from the truth. He grinned at the other boy. "Storms come in all forms." He shrugged. "Or maybe I'm just out here to enjoy the rising wind."

Speaking of which, the breeze picked up and plucked at his clothes and at his hair. The stillness of his form was further highlighted by all these things moving around him. He was wondering what this boy's game was. He hadn't been told that he was the sort of person who double-spoke, but that should have been predictable considering his background. Felix berated himself on the lack of foresight, but didn't find it disagreeable. The challenge was nice, if a bit foolish.

Suddenly, he felt the chill in the air biting through his jacket and shivered. Being still wasn't going to be feasible and he asked, "Care to walk with me until the smell of worms forces you inside?"

An almost annoyingly perfect smirk curved over Kylar’s lips at Felix’s explanation, oddly satisfied with it. “How would you know about the kind of closeness that happens inside, if you’re someone who stays outside?” he said, dropping any pretense of trying to be serious with that conversation. It was fun, dancing around with this guy’s words like they were. Kylar was usually more direct in his speech, but that wouldn’t feel right talking with Felix. He was starting to like this conversation. “You might want to try some of that inside stuff,” he suggested lightly with a slightly suggestive wink, playing around clearly. “You might like it better there.”

The wind picked up and it was chillier than Kylar had expected, making goose bumps race over his arms. He noticed the stillness with which Felix stood, wondering how he could manage to do that. Kylar was different, he swayed with the wind like he was part of it, his brown hair feathering in the gust and his jacket barely fluttering. He felt he had a better handle on Felix than the other had on him, knowing at least in part what he had really been doing there, watching the drama. But that didn’t really matter now. Kylar could tell they were both interested in the other, and even as they were talking about the weather, such a meaningless thing, they were really talking about other things and prodding at each other to see what buttons they could hit. Kylar didn’t have any game, there wasn’t anything he was trying to win. He was just moving the pieces around the board for the fun of it and pretending he was playing.

“I don’t see why not,” Kylar said, stepping towards him, a little too close, before brushing past and starting down one of the paths. It was like he just expected Felix to walk with him, because that’s what everyone did. Kylar was someone to follow, to run and try and catch up to. His strides were long and as quietly confident as they always were. The smell wouldn’t actually occur until the rain started to fall, so it might be the wind that drove him inside first. It was hard to say. Maybe he wouldn’t go inside at all for this particular storm. “So what else do you like, besides storms?” Kylar asked with a small grin, feeling oddly comfortable in this setting. It had been a while since he really enjoyed talking with someone else.

"And whoever said that?" Felix asked with a slight arch to his left eyebrow. "I find myself equally at ease inside as out." He waved the topic away with a dismissive hand, getting bored since it was about himself. He'd learned a couple of interesting tidbits, but what really sparked his attention was the suggestive wink.

He'd heard that Kylar was something of a flirt and a heart-breaker, especially to the ladies. Felix enjoyed a slightly similar rep, but his interests were nowhere near that focused. As Kylar stepped past him, so close that a more uptight person would have cringed back, Felix slipped one of his arms around the other's, linking loosely at the elbow. He lengthened his stride a little to keep up with the other boy, who walked with purpose when there really wasn't any. It wasn't like Kylar was significantly taller than Felix himself, but the disparity was enough that Felix did have to shift his normal pace. Or maybe he only noticed because he was so rarely in a hurry these days.

His answer was as dismissive as his gesture from before; he didn't enjoy talking about himself. "The usual. Good coffee and good company." A casual shrug, and he asked in a complete and abrupt subject change, "Winter break is coming up. What do you do during vacations? Do you go home?" He knew something about the answer already, but he wanted to see how the other boy would respond.

“Now I wonder what that says about you,” Kylar commented, not really bothering to actually wonder. Maybe if he was bored later on he could analyze everything, but now wasn’t the time for that. What was really speaking to him right now was the arm Felix hand looped through his own, and how interesting that was. He had completely thrown that wink out there, just to see what he would do with it, and Kylar wasn’t at all disappointed. Felix’s reputation as a bit of a flirt was one Kylar had heard of, and he found it interesting to test that. It spoke far more to have this guy attaching himself to his side than any preference for indoors or outdoors.

Kylar didn’t move away or lessen his pace or even look like he noticed much, even though he did. He didn’t mind one bit. The answers to his questions were short, and Kylar found himself a little disappointed Felix wasn’t more willing to talk about himself. But at the same time, it was more intriguing too, it required Kylar to work a little more for answers, and he wasn’t really used to that. “Oh, come on now,” he said with a small laugh, “I know you’re more interesting than that. Tell me something better.” Kylar gave him a sidelong glance, a kind of challenging look in his eyes. Impress me, it said. His walk changed ever so slightly, seeming to draw Felix closer to his side, pushing him just because he could.

His heavy eyebrow quirked upwards at the unexpected subject change, and a small hint of a smile might be seen just as he looked away. “No, I don’t go anywhere,” Kylar answered plainly, preferring not to think of that place as any sort of home. This school was more his home these days anyways. Felix must know something of his past, to try and direct his conversation in that direction, towards things he didn’t have. It was a smart move, and Felix had hit on something inside of him, but Kylar was too good to really slip up that much. “I’ll be staying here for break. And you? Going home?” Kylar looked back at him, honestly curious how he would respond. He didn’t know as much about the other guy, but enough to know that they seemed to have a similar story. He was willing to bet he wouldn’t be the only one spending break at school.

The silvery-haired boy shrugged. He found himself relying more and more on that gesture as time went on. He was fairly certain he had dumped his last partner with a shrug. Or, rather, the fellow had gotten irritated with his lack of emotion and had stormed off. Felix had gotten bored with the conquest once the physical part had been taken care of.

Felix waved a dismissive hand and merely raised his chin in defiance of Kylar's request. He had nothing to prove, no agenda to seek with regards to his hobbies. Furthermore, he was enough his own person to hardly be swayed by such incentives. Kylar was attractive, but not that attractive. Being closer to Kylar didn't bother him in the slightest. He'd slept with enough people of both sexes that it took a lot more than mere proximity to perturb him. Maybe if a demigod were to grace him with his/her presence... Besides, Kylar was straight, right?

Felix tipped his head, listening to the other boy's answer. No extraneous details. Good. Interesting. Perhaps he was touchier about that than he let on. He grinned. "I might venture to the mainland for business reasons, or to visit some extended family, but the 'rents are still pretty touchy about the thing I did before they kicked me out. I'll give them another year or so before even trying to rebuild that bridge. I don't really know my plans yet."

He quirked a wry smile at Kylar. "As many people here that have bad relations with their folks, I'm willing to bet it doesn't get too lonely here. Does the school do anything special for the holidays? I seem to recall the masquerade last year, but I don't remember you there... then again, with the disguises, it's unlikely I would remember your face."

Kylar noticed when his prompting went unanswered, and it made him smile. Felix must have some will, to be standing this long without giving in. He was liking that, Kylar always found strong people to be much more interesting to him in the long run. The other guy likely wasn’t aware, but he had managed to catch that elusive interest so far. It had been a long, and carefully kept secret, road to discovery about his interests, and surprisingly they weren’t limited to just girls. Guys could be just as fun to Kylar, maybe even a little more so, just from the difference in dynamics. He was used to having girls fall all over him, and that simply didn’t happen with guys nearly so much. It was more of a challenge. Not that he would ever intentionally admit he was bi. That was like social suicide for someone like him.

“Oh?” Kylar said, as thunder rumbled in the distance. “What sort of business?” It was unusual for kids at this school to be involved with business, just another interesting thing he was finding about Felix. Who, apparently, had been kicked out of his house. Tough situation, that, and he genuinely had Kylar’s sympathy. But being kicked out wasn’t really at all the same as his own story. Things had to have been really bad for anyone to leave their home voluntarily. And it certainly made his life tough now. There weren’t any bridges to try and rebuild between him and his family, they hadn’t even spoken since Kylar ran. “I wish you luck with that,” he said, oddly sincere despite his earlier teasing comments. If anyone had an opportunity to patch things up with their family, then not taking it would be wasteful in his eyes.

“I don’t know what they’re doing this year,” Kylar said with a small shrug. Oh dear, maybe he was picking up the habit from Felix. Kylar laughed at the mention of the masquerade, remembering how that had all went. “Oh, I was there for a short time, anyways. Left pretty quickly, though. Apparently I looked too good in that outfit. You know, tall, dark, and handsome…” His lips curved suggestively into something between a grin and a smirk. It wasn’t hard to catch his drift. But what might not have been gotten was who he had left with. That person had definitely not been female, and with their masks, Kylar still didn’t really know what had happened that night, or with whom. But it had been great, either way. Nothing like a good party for entertainment. “What was your costume like?” he asked, giving a sweeping glance over his current outfit and letting his warm eyes linger in a way that might seem rather obvious to other people. Felix certainly seemed to have a style of his own.

"A minor trade in material goods. Buy cheap, sell dear and all that. It gives me some change to rattle in my pockets and something to do when classes inevitably get boring." Felix was used to being evasive about this since he didn't like to mix his social life with his working one. Furthermore, to be clearer about it would be admitting his power, which he didn't generally like to do right off the bat. He'd made Sandra work hard for it, certainly, and he genuinely liked the girl's company.

He arched an eyebrow at the other boy and laughed a moment later. "Nah, luck isn't my issue. The 'rents are wise to most of my tricks, but I am their only offspring. They'll nurse their hurt pride and if I go back to them with remorse on my sleeves... well, it's just a matter of time." He lapsed into comfortable silence for a little after this admission. He didn't find this to be sensitive information considering admitting it barely hurt him at all. Being kicked out had been the result of his persistent tinkering under their roof. If given a choice, he would have done the exact same things again.

Knowing what he knew at this point in time, he had been pretty fortunate to have suffered the relatively minor consequences apparent on his person. The scar was problematic at times, the loss of his hair and eye color regrettable in a somewhat slight way, but none of those things were the worst possible outcomes.

The shift in topic was a welcome one, mostly because he was tiring of thinking about that part of his past. He listened in pensive silence, responding at length, "As diverting at the masquerade was, I'd be pleased for a simple formal this time around. Masquerades are always a pain to prepare for." He glanced at the fellow, smirking. "Oh, I'm sure. My attentions were with a certain young lady of my acquaintance, otherwise, I might have accosted you." He gestured vaguely. "I dressed as something too obscure for most of our peers to get, unfortunately. You might remember me as the somewhat damp fellow with a gold ring floating ahead of him. Or maybe you won't."

That costume had been a bit of a pain to make, actually, besides his hand in several others that had been worn to that event. He purposely kept his interference on a need-to-know basis, though. "Besides tall, dark, and handsome, did you have a theme to your costume? We should turn left here or you might be too far away from the school to avoid the worm smell."



||For reference, the thread was this one: forestaacademy.proboards.com/thread/2049/winter-masquerade

Felix was the Chamois Hunter.||

“Well that certainly sounds vaguely suspicious,” Kylar commented with a little laugh. “But whatever keeps you entertained, I suppose.” He knew how boredom could drive people to do anything but be bored. It had happened to him many times. Was kind of happening to him now, in fact. Talking with Felix was turning out to be a much better way to spend his time, for sure. Even if he did have the potential to repair his relationship with his parents while Kylar did not. But he could hardly hold it against the guy, it was luck. His parent’s could’ve been Kylar’s.

Kylar shrugged and said, “I didn’t find it too much of a pain. But I think you’re right, a simple formal might be easier this time around.” Of course it hadn’t been hard for Kylar, for him and his illusions. He hadn’t even had to go out and get a costume, he just made it seem like he was wearing one. And if anyone happened to suspect he was not, which was unlikely as he had put a lot of time and detail into that particular illusion, then at least he had been wearing actual nice clothes. Kylar grinned at the thought of Felix accosting him, but didn’t give any other sign that he found it a good thought to have. “No, I don’t remember you,” he said, shaking his head as the breeze picked up again and stirred his hair. Kylar shivered a little at the cold and took the turn to the left. The sooner he could get inside the better. “Damp with a gold ring? What were you? Gollum?”

He laughed at his own joke, seeming comfortably relaxed. “Well it was winter themed, right? So I was like Jack Frost. It was pretty cool, actually, you wanna see?” The whole costume had been an illusion anyways, he could literally pull it out of thin air. He didn’t really like revealing what his powers were, but most of the school knew anyways so he figured it hardly mattered if he kept it a secret or not, it wouldn’t be hard to find out.

"Suspicious, maybe. I like to keep my work and personal life separate when I can." The comment was off-hand and marked the end of that particular line of conversation, at least for Felix. The lines between his school life and his work life were blurred, especially since the masquerade and the incident with Delia.

Regardless, he didn't want to provoke any questions regarding his power.

He smiled, replying with only a small amount of indulgent condescension, "Of course you didn't find it to be too much trouble, but the rest of us can't just whisk a disguise out of thin air." Not that his own costume hadn't been mostly smoke and mirrors, but that was besides the point.

He shrugged at not being noticed, laughing with Kylar at the dig. "You know what? Sure, I was Gollum. Would've had more of an impact. Nobody here knows their Hans Christian Anderson and I'm not sure what convinced me they would at least give guessing a try."

Felix leveled a lopsided grin at the taller boy. "I would love to see it." He wondered if the other boy would use an illusion out here in the chill of the wind, or would he do it inside. Felix, for his part, really didn't feel like going back inside that much yet. He had some components left to gather outside.

Then again, he might be persuaded to go inside under the right incentives...

“Fair enough,” Kylar said with a small shrug, not really too concerned with the matter. He was perfectly willing to let the subject of Felix’s business matters drop for now. He figured if the guy ever did want him to know, he would just tell him. Most people were like that. “I should probably find some work of my own,” he mused, mostly to himself. Money was tight for someone like him, with no parents to help support him. When he had left home, he had taken a large amount of his parents’ money with him, but that ha dwindled significantly over the years. He’d have to get more from somewhere soon.

Kylar laughed at the teasing accusation, unable to deny it. “Yeah, well, so maybe I’m not a normal person,” Kylar said with a sparkling grin that was anything but normal. Normal people weren’t anything like Kylar, and he knew it. “But at least my powers came in handy for something.” He was a little proud of his illusionary costume, though, and actually had spent a long time on it. The work he had put in was a little different from that of others, however, since the whole thing was created from his mind. He had to make it look and feel real, had to have every little thread in the fabric carefully placed, and had had to hold onto it almost the entire night. So an easy thing it certainly was not. “And hey, at least people knew who I was.”

He was happy when Felix said he wanted to see it, Kylar loved to show off. Not that he would ever ever let on that he liked it. He was too good for that. He just grinned and looked away from Felix, having to concentrate and create everything exactly as he had. As they walked, points of colored light danced over him into their places, creating a glowing, shimmering look that was almost mesmerizing to watch. It formed a well-fit suit over his body, a deep dark blue that faded to a lighter one that was almost white. Literal frost clung to the edges of his sleeves and pants and he had a matching tie on as well. His skin seemed to lighten to an almost snowlike quality and frost clung to the tips of his hair. It was already impressive, but then he went a step further and made the mask as well. It sat perfectly in his face, accentuating his brow line and cheekbones. It was the same dark blue as his suit and still had frost on the edges of it. The whole thing seemed to be made out of an organic looking wire that wound itself into fractal patterns around his eyes. It would be nearly impossible to see Kylar under the entire illusion, and it would be safe to say his attractiveness level shot up through the roof.

“Well, here it is,” he said simply as they finally approached the doors to the building. It was tough to keep up the illusion in the wind, but it was also kind of fun to make the outfit move realistically with it. Maybe he should practice in the wind more often. Kylar stopped just in front of the doors and turned to look at Felix, an inciting smirk on his face. “But just a costume is boring, so I had something else too. I can’t really do it out here with all the wind, but if you come inside…I’ll show you something special.” Honestly, that probably sounded more suggestive than he had intended, but eh. Who cared at this point. He smiled and his teeth sparkled like fresh snow. He looked intriguing.

Felix ignored Kylar's comment, assuming it was an aside meant for nobody's benefit but his own. It wasn't like Kylar had skills Felix needed in his burgeoning operation. At least, no skills he himself did not already have. But, knowing that Kylar was interested in work was in itself interesting. For a moment, he considered how the other boy could dress himself so stylishly if he was cut off from the parental teat, and a slow smirk stretched his mouth.

Living on one's own could be an expensive endeavor, even with the school covering room and board. If Kylar had been here for a while, through a few growth spurts... well, an opulent taste for clothing would have added up over the years. Or, perhaps, he had been a saavy youth, and had not dressed in such a way until he got older. It did beg some research. Perhaps the library had the school photos from earlier years stashed away somewhere.

Felix rolled his eyes a little bit that Kylar's response. Nobody attending this school could claim normalcy. Most of the teachers were themselves gifted, and no matter how discreet a power could be, one was often thrown into strange situations regardless. The incident from last Winter had been proof enough of that. Hell, the incident with Delia had been proof enough of that, and nobody else knew about that. Felix's power wasn't as intrusive as those of the people around him; the only reason it had any effect on his life was because he actively pursued it.

He stepped back from the other boy at the beginning of the illusory transformation. He had to admit that Kylar's flair for the dramatic was, in this case, both tasteful and attractive. He made a couple mental notes for use in his own business. Kylar's masquerade disguise was almost perfect. There were a couple of barely-discernible flaws in the wind-movement.

Felix himself had encountered that problem with the floating-water portion of his own masquerade outfit until he'd worked out an algorithm to anchor the illusion to his clothes and add a factor for momentum and another for weightlessness. It had taken about three weeks to perfect, as well as several nights of sleep-powered energy. From what he did remember, he had been fairly intolerable those days. Sleep-madness would do that to a person.

"Impressive," he said, breaking his silence once he'd taken in all the details. No wonder Kylar had left early; this would be a nightmare to maintain for long, if illusions worked the way he thought they did. "Kylar, dear fellow, I shudder to think what you find amusing if this is your idea of boring." It didn't hurt Felix to stroke the other's ego a little. Further, Kylar, who had been attractive before, seemed all the more so now. Not that Felix was interested in pursuing this guy in earnest. More fun to play, then discard.

Safer too.

He grinned in response. "How could I refuse such an offer?" His reply was smoothly given and he, once again, invaded Kylar's personal space as he reached around the fellow to open the door for him. Warm air escaping from the entrance hall hit him in a wave, reinforcing how cold it had gotten outside. "After you," he added simply, wondering what on Earth something 'special' could be.