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In front of him, two rows down, sat the only other commoner in their year. Hans Becker, and he smiled something polite and distant at Kircheis when he caught him staring, likely aware of their shared connection. 

It wasn’t something Kircheis had thought about, not extensively, before joining Reinhard at the military academy. The miasma of nobility had wafted out from the city and snuck in from the countryside into the suburbs Kircheis had grown up in, but he had never thought to locate himself in relation to it so acutely before now. And as the other students would stare at him or frown or turn their heads away, sometimes scoffing derisively as his name was called during attendance, he realized he had never been made to.

Locking eyes with Becker, Kircheis had a brief flash of curiosity, as he knew he was only at the academy per an exception, and he wondered if Becker was somehow the same. But then a flash of golden movement caught Kircheis at the corner of his eye, just enough to draw his attention, and when he looked away, he looked toward Reinhard, and he didn’t think about Becker again. 

The other students didn’t like Kircheis or Reinhard. Kircheis, common, quiet, and—likely the most damning—just a hair taller than most their age, could not help but draw their attention. Reinhard, in his own way, was not a presence easily missed, and once noticed, his natural confidence, his abrasive intellect, disinclined him toward easy accommodation. Being a poor noble, and only willing to speak with Kircheis on friendly terms, added to his notoriety. And so Kircheis and Reinhard were well-known in place of being well-liked, and the distinction clung to them in the form of pointed looks and overheard whispers, preceding them like an omen or following them like a shadow. 

It made them careful together from the start, or at least it made Kircheis careful, and Reinhard usually willing to indulge him. And more so, it made Kircheis curious, almost apprehensively so, about the month Reinhard had spent at the academy before he could join him. But he couldn’t bring himself to ask, and Reinhard never spoke of it. Not as though he was avoiding the subject, but as if the time before Kircheis joined him didn’t matter, or simply didn’t exist. 

But something had changed during that time, or a previous change had crystallized, taken permanent form. Kircheis could trace it back, he knew, to that night they rushed toward Annerose and the Kaiser and ended up nowhere—nowhere that mattered—Reinhard’s wrist in Kircheis’s hand as they escaped just as quickly as they intruded. That night when Reinhard’s aimless, incisive intensity directed itself toward a purpose, one so far from his reach it practically hung itself in the stars. 

And since then, something volatile and tense in Reinhard had frozen, calcified under his skin, and he was often unhappy and impatient, Kircheis knew, even if he rarely expressed it. But as he kept himself and Kircheis so constantly close, there was no way not to see it. A restless, incisive bitterness that hummed just under his skin. 

“I would have done it alone,” Reinhard whispered once, after he had crawled into Kircheis’s bed without asking, simply telling Kircheis to move over, so they could whisper more easily to each other in the dark. They laid facing each other, Reinhard’s fingers loosely curled around Kircheis’s wrist. “I hadn’t had a friend before, and it hadn’t bothered me.”

“Reinhard…”

“But it’s better that you’re here, Kircheis,” Reinhard continued. I missed you, Reinhard didn’t say, but Kircheis could imagine he heard it. It had been little more than a month, that they were apart. And Kircheis had missed him too. “I’d rather have a friend with me.”

Kircheis nodded, and Reinhard yawned, apparently having nothing more to say on the subject. He crawled out of Kircheis’s bed, slipping back into his own, although some nights he chose to stay, rolling onto his stomach and falling asleep soon after. He never explained his decision one way or the other, and Kircheis didn’t press.

He liked it when Reinhard was close, when he stayed where Kircheis could see him. He preferred him closer still, so that Kircheis could reach out and pull him back from his own recklessness if he saw well enough to catch it in time. But that had nothing to do with Reinhard a few feet away, halfway across a dorm room and already asleep, and so Kircheis didn’t press. 

Instead, he shifted toward the center of his bed, where Reinhard had been, and it was warm. He fell asleep soon after, thoughts drifting off abstractly into nothing. 

At their old school, Kircheis knew he had an unearned reputation as Reinhard’s protector, or maybe his guardian. But the truth was Reinhard could worm his way into confrontation despite Kircheis’s best intentions to keep them both out. And while they would leave fights together, Kircheis leading Reinhard away—before they were caught, or before someone else could come to join—he often only showed up in time to pull Reinhard off another kid once a fight should have already been over. 

But at the military academy, students clustered into cliques, settling into groups that had familial histories spanning back two or more generations, histories which Kircheis didn’t know and Reinhard didn’t care to. And if Kircheis’s ignorance was expected, derisively enjoyed, then Reinhard’s apathy was damning, marking him in his deviance and then again in his unwillingness to bow his head in shame of it. 

“The Müsels have been poor nobles long enough that it only makes sense he’d hang out with the common kid,” an older student remarked, stepping before Reinhard and Kircheis and blocking their way on the path. 

“Still, it’s a disgrace,” another one replied. “I can’t tell which one is following the other around like a dog.”

Kircheis stepped back, a hand on Reinhard’s arm. A warning. Combat training started in the second year, and for an unknown reason, Reinhard and Kircheis were particularly disfavored by these two, both in their third. But Reinhard’s arm under his hand was tense, coiled, and something in what the students said was enough that Kircheis could sense he’d be unable to drag Reinhard away. 

Reinhard didn’t often pick fights himself, but under the right circumstances—with the right provocation—he would throw the first punch. And though he wasn’t the instigator, Reinhard still fought like each confrontation contained some predesigned intentionality. And it was clear to anyone paying attention—and Kircheis thought, perhaps that was only him—that he fought like someone was just over his shoulder, watching his back or anticipating his next move. 

Kircheis saw the moment just before Reinhard moved, launching himself at the boy closest to him, taking both students by surprise. A half second later, Kircheis ducked down to throw himself toward the taller boy’s middle, sending them both toward the ground. 

And Kircheis remembered one time before, when he had been halfway across campus, unhurried until he was at the edge of the inner courtyard and saw Reinhard and three others and knew the odds and expectations that both sent him running. 

Running to place himself where Reinhard already expected he would be. Something Kircheis would be inclined to call trust if it didn’t feel like something else. Like Reinhard had examined the fabric of the space around him and decided the only possibility was for Kircheis to be always there, a truth borne from logic rather than desire.  

He acted in accordance with that logic, making moves that only could be explained by the assumption that Kircheis could predict them and act in kind. 

And he wanted to. 

He didn’t know any other way to take care of Reinhard, to be his friend, other than to note where Reinhard believed their edges aligned and acting in accordance. And in some ways, it was easy. Because he found that Reinhard was right, that they fit together so naturally the seams disappeared until Kircheis thought to look for them again. 

But the temptation was infrequent, rarely apparent, especially when Reinhard would tug on Kircheis’s sleeve to pull him up after a fight, smiling and brushing back where Kircheis’s hair had fallen into his face. And so that was easy, too—to get swept away in reality as Reinhard saw it, to see his stubbornness as fact. With the years together stretched out before them, guaranteed in their time together at the academy and an unvoiced dream beyond that, it was hard—unappealing—to try and find the lines that separated them, something that seemed to hardly matter if they were never apart. 

The first time Reinhard went to visit his sister, he went alone. But after that, he always brought Kircheis along, though the visits were infrequent and short. 

But that first time Kircheis sat in the library alone, reading ahead for next week’s lectures. And two tables down was Lukas von Kuhn and Becker.

“Lukas—“

“Lord Kuhn,” Lukas cut him off, correcting him.

Kuhn wasn’t looking at Becker, was instead looking down at his book. 

“Lord Kuhn,” Becker repeated, eyes down, a small frown that only Kircheis could see ghosting his expression. “We should try this equation instead.” 

Kuhn flicked his eyes up, irritated, but oddly, Kircheis thought, Becker refused to back down, meeting Kuhn’s displeasure with an even expression. Their conversation devolved into a strange bickering—Kuhn haughty and incorrect and Becker caught between deferential and unable to keep himself from arguing back. Kircheis watched the encounter, biting his tongue with a strange anxiety, before eventually leaving, deciding to continue studying in their room until Reinhard returned. 

It was late, well past sunset when he did, and he removed his uniform with jerky, agitated motions, climbing into bed without otherwise speaking. “You’ll come with me next time, Kircheis,” Reinhard said to the wall. And Kircheis nodded, though Reinhard couldn’t see him.

Kircheis licked his lips nervously, considering. “…How was Annerose? Is she doing—well?”

“How could she be?” Reinhard spat back irritation. “How could anyone—“ he cut himself off. “You’ll come with me next time, Kircheis,” Reinhard repeated. “She asked if you were liking the academy. My sister will be happy to see you.”

Reinhard’s words were stiff, mechanical, and Kircheis bit his tongue, unsure what to say or do. 

“You’ll come, won’t you, Kircheis?” Reinhard finally turned around. “Next time, we’ll go together.”

“Of course, Reinhard,” Kircheis said softly, though the words felt unnecessary. As though his answer was structured into the question itself, and to give voice to it was a mere redundancy.

Reinhard nodded, before turning onto his back, looking up at the ceiling. He didn’t say anything else, but his tension settled into the room itself, and Kircheis found it difficult that night to fall asleep. 

As the weeks melted into months, Reinhard’s mutual animosity with the other students neither escalated nor disappeared but instead seemed to rot, decomposing from the inside out. While Reinhard had earned his notoriety as an abrasive novelty, a different resentment grew between him and the other students when the rumors began to spread and then solidify of his sister and her new seat next to the throne.

Whereas before Reinhard would end such fights with an air of indifference, or satisfaction, if he found Kircheis had acted particularly well attuned to himself, his bitter resentment now carried over and bled out as he stalked away from each confrontation, his hands clenched into fists, muttering about nobles and cowards and newly-washed uniforms stained with blood.

And Kircheis learned to not to pull Reinhard from a fight too soon. Because if he couldn’t be sure that he had won, then—if provoked, or if he felt justified—he would find the same boys with or without Kircheis and choose to fight again.

It was all Kircheis could do to try to help keep that barely contained resentment in check, watching behind Reinhard for enemies as he watched Reinhard too from the corner of his eye, noting the way his hand would twitch or shake in history class, or in the courtyards or the cafeteria, or when they went down the long line of military codes that all told them the same fate with different words: Your life is not your own. Your life is the military’s. The empire’s. The Kaiser's. And so you will do what you are told. 

Watching Reinhard’s reaction, and knowing that this meant Reinhard was primed to find some reckless way to pick at his own anger, dig his fingernails into his barely scabbed resentment until it again started to bleed. Kircheis would shift in his seat, pressing their forearms together or simply moving enough that Reinhard would look, reactive and involuntary, at Kircheis from the corner of his eye. 

And Kircheis didn’t know what to do—how to temper Reinhard’s seething righteousness—but sometimes it was enough simply to catch his attention. And he’d look at Kircheis and his face would soften, or the tense line of the back of his hand would relax, and Kircheis, still looking at Reinhard, would smile, small and relieved. 

And sometimes that was enough, though Kircheis couldn’t say why. 

On days off—Sundays, occasionally the odd holiday—Kircheis would wake up earlier than necessary and plan the day ahead. Shaking Reinhard by the shoulder even as he mumbled and complained because if he let him sleep in too long, that annoyed him even more.

“There’s a trail nearby, Reinhard. Would you like to go with me?” he asked, and he always asked in this way, because Kircheis had found that Reinhard was more amenable to the idea that he was indulging Kircheis’s whims than being made to do something for his own good.

Reinhard smiled, soft and still half-asleep.

“I never knew you liked hiking so much.” But Kircheis knew almost nothing about hiking, though he didn’t correct him. He enjoyed these days with Reinhard, with no one else around them, far enough away from the academy to pretend they existed outside its influence altogether, so it wasn’t really a lie to agree. “If that’s what you want to do.”

And then he and Reinhard would set off, slipping away from campus as if they were sneaking out, though there was no rule against leaving on days off. 

As they wandered through the woods, or the fields, or some other place far from everything else, sometimes talking but often not, Kircheis would wait, brushing shoulders with Reinhard’s as they walked together. He would wait, and eventually, Reinhard would stumble over his own anger again, and it would swell up inside him until it cracked. 

And their last confrontation with some upperclassmen, or a professor’s latest lecture, or just the rot of the empire—which Reinhard was so certain he could feel, could breathe in and choke on—would come pouring out of him, in fits and starts of barely coherent resentment.

“Useless,” he spat out, catching one fist in the other. “They’re all useless. I can’t stand to look at them. To think about the power they hold over me. Over my sister.” 

Kircheis nodded, before saying quietly, “I know, Reinhard.”

And sometimes Reinhard would continue, speaking in a feverish haze of anger and emotion, circular and recursive, and always back to the same conclusion: that, one day, things would be different. That, one day, they would have to make no concessions to the whims of those that they detested. 

But other times he would fall silent, holding Kircheis first with his eyes and then on the arm or at the shoulder, and once, Kircheis remembered, fingers locked around his wrist, and he would nod as something silent and inexpressible passed between them, before pressing on again, pulling Kircheis along with him.

They never went anywhere specific, or at least Kircheis had no real destination in mind. They just wandered out as far as they could justify before eventually returning, on the cusp of dark or just past it, often having to sneak back in, which Reinhard seemed particularly delighted by, though he would never admit it.

But back in the safety of their dorm room, they’d collapse into their beds—or Reinhard into Kircheis’s along with him—and Kircheis would fall asleep easily, exhausted and content. 

In their first few years, Kircheis and Reinhard had limited access to the various training areas, and Kircheis found it better to shuffle himself and Reinhard through the main courtyard only during its busiest hours, avoiding the area otherwise as ripe for unexpected confrontation. So they often found themselves in the library—large, at least twice as large as the library at their old school—hidden among the shelves and passing time after class or before curfew there. 

Kircheis liked finding a table near a far corner of the shelves, choosing a book for him and Reinhard to read together, even as they bumped elbows, or even as Reinhard would poke him insistently in the side because he didn’t like the interval at which Kircheis would turn the pages.

Kircheis knew he was being indulged, that he liked novels and tales that made Reinhard’s interest wander, but Reinhard equally refused to weigh in on the books Kircheis chose, smiling like he was telling a private joke when he claimed it was Kircheis’s job to do so himself. 

Reinhard kept his own erratic reading schedule that started in fits and stops depending on a fluctuating interest Kircheis found difficult to track, although he had a chronic, consistent disinterest in their textbooks. He was too serious to be less than a perfect student, but their first few years consisted largely of common curriculum and military codes, neither of which held Reinhard’s attention.

Whereas Kircheis preferred to take notes and then read them, solidifying the concepts in his mind, Reinhard tossed books aside, rolling over onto his stomach and dismissing them as not worth his time. He’d sneak military histories and tactical manuals out of the library, handing them off to Kircheis when he was done, though he never made any attempt to discuss the books directly. 

Instead, he’d set up imagined scenarios with their utensils at lunch—their pencils and paperweights across the dorm room floor—quizzing Kircheis and himself before handing the tools of his mock fleets off to Kircheis and asking him to do the same. 

It was slowly, like this, that something in Reinhard seemed to settle down. Either he adjusted to the academy, or several class rankings in, as Reinhard consistently found himself at the top, he had grown satisfied that he was making progress toward something rather than merely languishing in a place he hated surrounded by people he couldn’t stand. 

That part of Reinhard that froze over didn’t thaw, and as his anger tempered, a muted, affected seriousness took its place, a performance Kircheis hardly understood until Reinhard said to him, offhanded and certain, “I can’t think of this time here as mine. It’s not. It belongs to my sister.”

Kircheis frowned. “What do you mean?” 

“She gave it to me,” Reinhard explained, voice tight. He had a far off look in his eyes, something intense and distant. It made him look older, or like a stranger. “I have to find out how to give it back.”

That was one of Reinhard’s gifts, Kircheis thought, to make impossible things sound like they could be true. And it was difficult to correct him, to imagine trying, because etched into Reinhard’s certainty was almost a neediness, or a latent expectation, like such things had to be true because there was no way Reinhard could conceive the world otherwise. 

“You will, Reinhard,” Kircheis said, because the notion was easy to speak once Reinhard had already done so, had already fashioned a future in words if not yet in deeds. And part of Reinhard seemed to live in that future: where abstract debts had been paid, erasing old pains along with them.

But Kircheis saw flashes of him, that boy with a different lightness from a time more like a dream than the past. Such as when Reinhard insisted they were too old, too busy, for childish games, but occasionally he’d keep Kircheis up late, spinning a story of a campus controversy and deciding they needed to investigate. He’d catch Kircheis’s hand in his, though it wasn’t necessary, and pull him along as they snuck out of their dorm and around campus, chasing the phantoms of the scenario Reinhard had dreamed up to excuse their aimless wanderings. 

“They’re all corrupt,” Reinhard whispered to Kircheis as they snuck down a random hall. “All the professors, all the administrators. And we’ll find the proof.”

And while Kircheis was no stranger to the obvious apathy of the dean, or the blatant favoritism to the wealthier students of their history professor, he knew he and Reinhard were simply chasing shadows, play-acting at being able to take down the highest authority they could see.

Kircheis smiled. “Of course, Reinhard.”

And Reinhard took his hand again as they crept through the night together, trading conspiracies in the dark and whispering about justice. And each excursion always ended the same, with them stumbling together back to their dorm, exhausted and giddy, with nothing to show for their efforts. Kircheis would roll over onto his side, facing Reinhard either a few inches away or across the room, often already asleep. Kircheis would smile, something private for himself, and he’d drift off too. 

At night, Kircheis dreamed of sitting on his bed next to Reinhard, who had been injured during training. Or had fallen during one of their hikes. Or he didn’t know at all, had no knowledge to place their positions in the dream. 

But they sat close, and there was always Kircheis, holding Reinhard’s hand in his own, slowly unwrapping the bandage from his forearm. And the wound was small, just a minor cut, but Kircheis traced it reverently with his fingertips regardless, gentle and slow.

Neither he nor Reinhard spoke, but the moment meant something, Kircheis knew, if he could solve its language before the dream ended.

But their closeness was distracting, though it had no reason to be; Reinhard was always tugging Kricheis along, pulling him close when he felt some minor shift in their orbit. And Kircheis liked it, went willingly, would sometimes think to do the same himself, though it was hard to find the throughline from the thought to action, to justify an impulse that Reinhard always made elegant in its apparent meaninglessness.

Their legs pressed together, Reinhard’s wrist in his hand, Kircheis found it difficult to imagine them closer, but he wanted it. Wanted it differently, though he couldn’t say how. 

And he imagined, briefly, the notion of bringing Reinhard’s wrist closer, to his lips, kissing just under the cut. The thought was bold, too bold, a desire outside even the strangeness of the dream, and it woke him. It always did. 

Laying in bed, the dream unfinished, Kircheis felt hot, flushed, staring at the ceiling in a daze as a strange and unknown sensation pooled in his stomach. And he would look over to Reinhard, still asleep, and feel guilty, as though he had been caught in a lie, or had taken something without bothering to ask. 

While the strictures of the military were firmly etched into their education from its inception, a familiarity with its practices snuck up on Kircheis, from the first time he held a blaster and his hands shook minutely as he aimed and shot, to the combat training which happen once, then twice, three times a week until it increased to a near daily habit. 

Kircheis knew he could sit through classes, and memorize dates, learn codes and swallow orders he would hate—he knew he could follow, especially with Reinhard just off to the side, with the thought that he would one day lead, that Kircheis could follow Reinhard down his path back to his sister, the three of them together once again. 

But he had been wary and nervous, unsure being a solider could suit him in the ways that really mattered. With a gun in his hand, or with the swing of an axe. But he took to it like he didn’t expect, or at least he grew better and better, improving at a rate he couldn’t account for, until the latest class rankings were posted, Reinhard at the top and Kircheis right below him in all areas except weapons firing and combat. In those areas, Kircheis excelled. 

Reinhard and Kircheis stood next to each other, staring at the results together. Kircheis felt tense, anticipatory, because while Reinhard found grades useless, Kircheis wondered if this was in part because Reinhard had never felt challenged in his ability to be above them, to find himself effortlessly at the top. 

Next to him, Reinhard laughed, clapping him on the shoulder. 

“Kircheis,” he said playfully, giving him a sly smile. “You must be more vicious than I realized, with grades like these. Have you been holding out on me?” 

Kircheis smiled awkwardly, pleased to see Reinhard happy but unsure how to interpret his mirth. “It’s nothing, Reinhard.”

“Maybe I should just let you handle any fights from now on…” 

“Reinhard,” Kircheis chastised, not serious, but only willing to indulge Reinhard’s ill-natured humor so far. 

But Reinhard simply kept laughing, using his hand on his shoulder to bring Kircheis along with him as he walked away. 

And while Reinhard hardly seemed to care, or took some sort of strange delight in it, Kircheis spent the next few days in minor notoriety, earning odd looks and comments from students in their year who otherwise had chosen to ignore Kircheis’s existence to the best of their ability before now. He was approached, once or twice, for tips or advice, and Kircheis navigated the conversations awkwardly, unused to the attention. 

And even Kuhn cornered Kircheis in the library, Becker half a step behind him. Since their first year, Kircheis had paid both of them little attention; Kuhn was generally quiet but arrogant, and he and Becker appeared to orbit each other in a bizarre, mutually antagonistic friendship. Constantly bickering, and yet rarely apart, Kircheis couldn’t imagine he was on their radar, either. 

“Kircheis, is it?” Kuhn asked. “Müsel’s friend?” 

“Yes…” Kircheis trailed off, uncertain. “Do you need to speak to Reinhard?”

Kuhn frowned, and behind him, Becker shook his head. 

“I wonder how you managed that,” Kuhn continued, as though he hadn’t heard Kircheis’s question. 

Becker smiled, nervous and explanatory. “He’s completely uninterested in the rest of us.”

“Reinhard and I met before the academy,” Kircheis answered, feeling oddly cornered, on the receiving end of both their remarks at once. 

“So did Lord Kuhn and I.” Becker nodded, giving Kircheis a strange, significant look. “My mother worked on his family’s estate, so we grew up nearby.” 

Kircheis nodded, unsure what to say.

“He lived in the servants quarters,” Kuhn corrected. “Although I can’t imagine that’s how you and Müsel were acquainted.” 

“No.” Kircheis frowned. “We were neighbors. I met Reinhard when he moved in next door.” 

Kuhn’s eyes narrowed, and Becker looked agitated, peeking at him from the corner of his eyes. 

“Lord Kuhn and I were just talking about how impressive Lord Müsel is,” Becker quickly said, before smiling. “Although you’re always right behind him. Better than him, in some places.”

Kircheis blinked. “I wouldn’t say that.”

“Of course not,” Kuhn replied. He was still frowning at Kircheis. “You should really—“

“Kircheis.” Kircheis felt a hand on his shoulder, and he turned, Reinhard standing behind him. “I found the book we were looking for.”

“Oh,” Kircheis smiled as he answered. “Good. I was thinking we might want this one, as well.”

He held the book in his hand out to Reinhard, who took it, inspecting the cover. He made no attempt to greet Kuhn or Becker, which Kircheis found rude, but it strangely relieved him. 

He followed Reinhard as he walked away, Reinhard’s hand still on his shoulder, tense before relaxing, and then tense again.

Back in their room, Reinhard stared down at the book he had been looking for, unhappy. Kircheis waited, watching as Reinhard tapped a finger against its edge.

“Is something wrong, Reinhard?” Kircheis asked once it became apparent that Reinhard would not speak of his own accord. 

“You shouldn’t let others speak to you like that.” Reinhard snapped his book shut as he spoke. 

“Like… what?” Kircheis asked. 

“He was talking down to you.” Reinhard scoffed. “Or he was trying to.”

“I guess I didn’t notice…” Kircheis trailed off, considering the conversation further. It was strange, though not for reasons that bothered Reinhard. He thought about Kuhn and Becker, their shared childhood with a wall between it. They seemed oddly in sync, a familiarity borne from years of acquaintance, and yet…

“Do you think they’re friends?” Kircheis asked. 

“Who?” Reinhard continued before Kircheis could answer. “Kuhn and Becker?” 

Kircheis nodded, oddly anxious to hear Reinhard’s answer. 

Reinhard shook his head, turning to look out the window as he thought. “I don’t see how,” Reinhard finally answered. “Or if they are, I can hardly see the appeal of such a friendship.”

“What do you mean?” 

Reinhard’s fingers were tapping his book absently, and he took much longer to answer. “They seem… close,” Reinhard finally managed. “But Kuhn doesn’t want a friend.”

“You don’t think that’s the same thing?”

“No,” Reinhard said immediately. “I don’t.” After a slight pause, he continued, “Kuhn just wants someone who will follow him around. It’s not the same as having a friend.”

“I suppose,” Kircheis agreed, though he wasn’t entirely sure. Those two were stranger than that, harder to define—an odd mix of familiarity and formality that Kircheis found difficult to read. 

Reinhard flopped back onto the bed, book forgotten. He looked up to the ceiling, studying it almost as if it were the night sky. He asked quietly, voice soft, “Do you wish you had other friends here, Kircheis? Or… do you miss your friends from back home?”

Kircheis paused, trying to truly consider the question. 

“I don’t really think about it,” he said honestly. He pushed his own book off his lap, leaning back to lie next to Reinhard. “That all feels so far away.” 

Reinhard nodded, not replying. 

“Do you?” Kircheis asked tentatively. 

“No,” Reinhard said instantly. “I don’t need other friends.” 

The immediacy of Reinhard’s answer shocked Kircheis, and he turned on his side quickly, staring directly at Reinhard. Reinhard was already looking at Kircheis, an oddly stubborn expression on his face. 

“What?” Kircheis asked. “Don’t you want—“

Reinhard was quick. Grabbing Kircheis at the arm, he leaned in, a flash, pressing his lips briefly to Kircheis’s.

Stunned, Kircheis said nothing as Reinhard pulled back.

“Do you understand now?” he asked, staring at Kircheis expectantly even as his own cheeks revealed a dull red. When Kircheis failed to respond, he continued, “I will have subordinates. Advisors. Those who will follow me and do as I ask. That is not the same as having you. I don’t need other friends, Kircheis. I don’t want them.” He watched Kircheis’s eyes as he leaned in again, his hand still gripped on Kircheis’s shoulder. The kiss was only a fraction longer than the last. He repeated, more insistent, “Do you understand now?”

Kircheis nodded, though his head felt light, and the words seemed far away. He wanted to touch his lips. Tentatively, instead, he placed a hand over Reinhard’s own on his arm. He squeezed gently, and when Reinhard smiled, Kircheis echoed the expression without thought. 

Reinhard didn’t kiss Kircheis often, although Kircheis felt like he was always expecting it, measuring time between one and the next. But he was liberal with his other touches, even more so than before, wrapping them up together when he crawled into Kircheis’s bed, or stretching his legs out under library tables so their ankles brushed. Tugging on his hair absently to get his attention.

But Kircheis wasn’t the only one paying attention.

As they had gotten older—as Reinhard earned himself a reputation as someone at least not to be underestimated, as he wasn’t likely to be ignored—the number of conflicts they weathered decreased, but Reinhard remained chronically unpopular with a particular crowd. He dismissed them as the sons of aristocratic social climbers who “had incorrectly chosen the military to flounder their own attempts,” likely not thinking of them beyond this assessment, but their open hostility made Kircheis wary. 

“It’s Müsel and his pet, isn’t it?” Kircheis heard from a few feet away. “Or was it the other way around?”

Reinhard’s hand rested on his shoulder, at the crook of his neck, and the warmth of his hand was bleeding through his uniform, except for his index finger, which Reinhard curved around the back of his collar, the tip of it settling just above where the fabric met his skin. When he heard the other student speak, Reinhard’s grip tightened, but he didn’t remove his hand.

Kircheis grimaced, eyes flicking between Reinhard’s scowl and the group of students standing back at the edge of the grass. 

“Müsel’s too pretty to be a dog,” another one replied derisively. “He looks more like his sister than a soldier.”

“And we all know he keeps that commoner around for something other than just his ego.” And the whole group laughed, high and mean.

Reinhard failed to react to their words, but Kircheis’s spine stiffened. And it was only now, once something requiring discretion existed between him and Reinhard, that Kircheis could recognize all the ways in which they failed to be discreet. And Kircheis felt suddenly exposed, under inspection, though the brunt of their attention appeared to be on Reinhard, waiting for his response, and Kircheis regulated to the role of accessory to the accusation. 

But Reinhard hardly seemed to care—that they were outnumbered, that he couldn’t afford to have such a rumor spread around, much less because it was actually true. And Kircheis thought of their multitude of misdemeanors—Reinhard’s casual affection and minor touches—all stacked up against them, with only so many ways to be read. 

“Kircheis,” Reinhard said, voice a calm note, as if nothing bothered him at all. It almost relaxed Kircheis, to hear his name in Reinhard’s mouth so lacking in self-consciousness, without worry.

And Kircheis suddenly thought about the strangeness of that: his parents’ name, his inheritance, but Reinhard chose it for him. Because between two options, he had found one more beautiful, and decided that it suited Kircheis more. 

But he was Kircheis here, too, in this uniform, as it sat on his frame and somehow outlined his indiscretions. And if Reinhard had chosen his name, then the academy gave it form. Demanding a certain posture when he heard it called. And he would stand at attention and then do as he was told. 

Kircheis, he thought, but he couldn’t make it sound the same in his head as it did on Reinhard’s tongue. Effortless, or without pretense. And it was a name that demanded a different role depending on who voiced the call, on who was watching his behavior to see how he filled the name.

And he thought, oddly, of Becker and Kuhn, the strange way their formality obfuscated their animosity, or their friendship. And that there were benefits to denying legibility, or conceding to a different set of signs through which to be read. 

Kircheis stepped forward and away, causing Reinhard’s hand to drop. He dipped his head, eyes lowering.

“Lord Reinhard,” he said, voice loud enough to carry, and it felt awkward on his tongue. “We’ll be late for class, Lord Reinhard.”

And he repeated the name to break Reinhard from his shock, something he noticed without looking for it, because he recognized the stillness of his eyes and the involuntary, emotional twitch of his hand where it had fallen to his side.

Most of what Reinhard said to Kircheis he said in his eyes, the way he grabbed his arm or leaned in close to speak against his ear. He expected Kircheis to read him as much as he listened, and now was no different. So when he turned to Kircheis and asked, “Oh? It is that late already?” what he meant was neither in his words nor his tone but the way his eyes flashed and his hand twitched toward Kircheis before holding in place.

And while it made something sour settle in his stomach, he looked behind Reinhard as he spoke, shoulders stiff, watching the interest of the students behind them as it balanced on a knife’s edge, and answered, “Yes, Lord Reinhard.”

“We should hurry, then,” Reinhard replied, his voice carefully blank. It was the right part for the performance, Kircheis thought, but Reinhard had no interest in their audience. 

He walked past Kircheis without looking back, not at him and not at their classmates, and Kircheis did the same, back tense. Waiting. Waiting to feel the air displace behind him. Waiting for the moment to break in half, to reveal something worse. But they walked out of the courtyard, jeering behind them, but nothing else ever came. 

But Kircheis found little relief once they had made it to their lecture hall, nor could he escape Reinhard’s own obvious, coiled displeasure. And they sat next to each other in another lecture on the empire’s history, one long stretch of perfect loyalty to a Kaiser where nothing outside or before mattered, with Goldenbaum’s shadow cast across history, trapping everyone inside. 

But Kircheis could only watch Reinhard’s hand, the way it curled on the desk and tensed and flexed and tensed again. 

After class, Kircheis and Reinhard walked back to their room in strained silence. And at the end of the hall, before the dorms, Becker and Kuhn stood bickering again. Kircheis watched them, unusually curious, as they leaned into each other’s space, whispering heatedly back and forth to one another. 

There was something intimate in that, Kircheis decided, how easily they expressed themselves to one another. And Kircheis tried to watch them discreetly, looking for cues to help him dissect each odd layer he could see. Reinhard was right, that there was something uneven there. Something that was easy to ascribe to their disparate ranks, the wide gap between their social stations.

“Lord Kuhn,” Becker grit out, suddenly grabbing the other boy on the arm as Kircheis passed. “Don’t you think—“

But Kircheis didn’t hear the rest, and he bit the inside of his cheek, worrying it between his teeth, thinking. Kircheis wanted it to be more complicated than that; he wanted there to be a different tie to bind them and different friction that underscored it all, but he couldn’t say. He didn’t know. And he couldn’t locate his interest, couldn’t justify it past a fleeting curiosity. 

He looked suddenly toward Reinhard, who was walking slightly ahead, noting the way his golden hair reflected the light. He was beautiful, Kircheis knew, but beauty was just another way that Reinhard made himself unmistakable, unable to avoid drawing attention and then unwilling to accommodate that attention with his behavior. 

The thought made Kircheis smile, fond and sad. Reinhard could be no one but himself, would never deign to try, and the extended danger of that was just now pricking on the edge of Kircheis’s mind, how Reinhard could so easily be used against himself. 

“Lord Reinhard,” Kircheis said, feeling the title on his tongue again. “We should train before dinner. I reserved some extra time at the range for us this morning.”

Reinhard nodded, not turning to look at Kircheis as he spoke. 

The next few hours were tense, uncomfortable. Reinhard’s mood evolved, from quietly displeased to something more direct, challenging, and he put Kircheis in the position to say his name, again and again, simply so Kircheis could tell him something he didn’t want to hear. 

“Lord Reinhard,” Kircheis would repeat, and Reinhard would tense up, frown, step even closer and look at Kricheis as though he could extract the title from the name, break them apart as they formed in his throat.

But Kircheis always had one eye on Reinhard and one around them, and he wondered as Reinhard put a hand around the crook of his elbow, or stood close enough that he spoke right next to Kircheis’s ear, how they were being read, if it was an oversight for Kircheis not to have considered it before. 

Later that night, when they finally returned to their room, Reinhard rounded on him immediately. 

“Why do you keep calling me that?” He looked at Kircheis intently. “What are you doing?” 

“Lord—Reinhard,” he corrected, but too late, and it sounded no different. “You are—“ He cut himself off again. Reinhard was proud and stubborn, and if he thought Kircheis only had a mind to ward off the judgment of others, he’d assert himself to some sort of breaking point. He settled on, cautiously, “We’ll be graduating soon.”

“And?” Reinhard demanded, impatient. 

“If you are to rise through the ranks,” Kircheis began slowly. “You have to concede something.” 

“You? It must be you?” Reinhard asked. “Then I—“

“No. Lor—Reinhard. No.” Kircheis held up his hands. “But the part of you that thinks he cannot look the same as them, in any way. You will sometimes have to look the part.”

Reinhard tensed, hands clenching into fists as he turned around. “Lord Reinhard, Lord Reinhard,” he repeated derisively. “You insist, then? On referring to me the same way we must all those men we hate?”

Kircheis’s lips pressed into a thin line, and he held himself back from replying because his first thought was one he didn’t know how to place. That in every way Reinhard contrasted against them—those nobles, the careless persons looking down at all of them from above—there was something reflective there, too.

A bearing Kircheis couldn’t articulate, some sort of natural grace when handling the weight of power, though Reinhard had barely any at all. And it suited him, sometimes. It sounded elegant, almost natural. Lord Reinhard, Kircheis thought, and it hardly felt as awkward as it did before. And he didn’t know how to say it. That the word was the same but when applied to him Kircheis meant it as something just a bit different. Just enough to make it okay. 

Kircheis’s silence frustrated Reinhard, and Reinhard turned around, making a dismissive noise. “Do what you please, then,” he decided. He looked back at Kircheis, his face hard and strangely inscrutable. “But not when we’re alone. Don’t call me that when we’re alone.”

And it was a concession, though Reinhard would never admit to it as such. That he understood what Kircheis had said, and that some part of him had been compelled to agree. 

It was only later, months ahead, after Reinhard had stopped correcting him in private when Kircheis would carry the title over from the end of the day, awkwardly fumbling between one name and another—the two losing distinction in his mind, as they were both Reinhard—that Kircheis realized what exactly he had seen.

When Reinhard had stood above him, his arm outstretched, and asked Kircheis to come with him again. 

When Kircheis took Reinhard’s hand, Reinhard pulling him up to stand with him, saying, “The universe will be ours, together.” 

And Kircheis stared at Reinhard, thinking of their hands still clasped together. It was a small detail, nothing compared to the weight of the words between them, but it was warm, and Kircheis thought of that as he replied, “Please, win the universe, Lord Reinhard.” 

Reinhard’s eyes shone, bright and clear, and Kircheis saw it again, that kernel of something he had recognized before, some intrinsic light that he had no words for. Like the glare of a nearby sun, caught at the height of the day. 

And maybe Reinhard didn’t have it yet—power, agency, a path into the stars—but he would. He knew it as he answered, as Reinhard still held Kircheis’s hand in his, as they stared out at the night sky together. 

And Kircheis didn’t have a name for it: that strange, alluring audacity that made Reinhard look up into the night sky and think it was something he could take, that it could be just barely out of reach. But it was the same, restless light that Kircheis had spotted before, shining and strange and just present enough to hang a title on, to put to words in the only language Kircheis had to give it.

They stumbled back to the dorms, hands locked together and neither willing to let go. When they snuck back in—by then, so late they had no other choice—Reinhard tugged Kircheis along with him, pulling him so they collapsed into Kircheis’s bed together, giddy and reckless and still in their uniforms, stealing looks and not speaking at all. Reinhard kissed him, running his hands gently though his hair as he did, laughing against his lips and refusing to let the two of them part. 

As graduation crept closer, something restless started to stir in Reinhard again, or Reinhard found less reason to temper it, the way he anticipated leaving the academy to begin the long climb that stretched beyond it. 

He received word of being made valedictorian and with it a letter from the military’s personnel center, with some details concerning his rank and placement after graduation. 

Reinhard stared down at the letter, before handing it off to Kircheis. Then, he began to pace. 

“Ensign…” he trailed off. “I’m graduating as an Ensign.”

Kircheis tried to smile, tried to temper Reinhard’s agitated movements. “Congratulations, Lord Reinhard.”

Reinhard whipped around. “It is—that man. It must have been him. These sorts of exceptions are never made.” Reinhard scoffed. “Except perhaps for the sons of high nobles.” 

“We can’t have his disdain, Lord Reinhard,” Kircheis reminded him. And then, lower, barely a whisper, although they were alone in the room, “or his suspicion.” 

“I do not—cannot have that man’s favor,” Reinhard spat out. “I won’t—“

“Have you not already had it?” Kircheis asked, voice uncharacteristically firm. “I would not be graduating here with you otherwise.” 

Reinhard froze, his whole body motionless. He appeared to stare past Kircheis toward a point beyond sight, a strange and ugly light in his eyes. He was so still, he hardly looked like he was breathing, and Kircheis reached out, circling his fingers around Reinhard’s wrist. He rubbed it gently with his thumb, attempting to soothe, but Reinhard remained still like stone, somewhere far off. 

“Lord Reinhard…” Kircheis said gently, trailing off. He bit his tongue so he wouldn’t apologize, if only to remove that awful gleam in his eyes. It had been something Reinhard needed to hear, so he wouldn't apologize. 

Reinhard didn’t relax, not exactly, but he turned minutely toward Kircheis, and they locked eyes. Reinhard nodded, clipped and unhappy. “Even as an admiral, the universe would be out of my grasp. I would need to be even higher than that.” 

“And your sister,” Kircheis continued. “She is too close to the Kaiser to risk his displeasure, Lord Reinhard.” 

Reinhard nodded, turning away from Kircheis. His wrist fell out of Kircheis’s grasp, and Reinhard walked to stand by the window, looking out and not speaking. Kircheis watched as Reinhard held his own wrist with his other hand as he stared out, tightening and loosening his grip in an erratic rhythm. 

He watched but didn’t speak, unsure what to say. 

On the cusp of graduation, just a week before the ceremony, Reinhard caught a fever. It was the only time Kircheis had ever seen him sick, and it made Reinhard restless, prone to childishness, pulling Kircheis into bed to curl around him before kicking him out just as quickly, claiming he was too tall and too hot and taking up too much space. 

He refused to go to the school infirmary, and when Kircheis had gone to the cafeteria to find him something light for his stomach, he had gotten out of bed and half dressed himself in his uniform before crawling back in, on top of the blankets, exhausted and shivering. 

Kircheis helped him out of his uniform, though Reinhard was only half awake and mumbling, making halfhearted protests as Kircheis tucked him back into bed. His eyes slid open, and he blinked several times, gaze hazy and unspecific until he focused on Kircheis. 

“I had a dream I pulled down the night sky,” Reinhard said, his cheeks flushed. He was frowning at Kircheis, and the glassy reflection of his eyes made the statement stranger than it really was. 

“I’m not sure I understand, Lord Reinhard,” Kircheis replied, smiling regardless, wiping the sweat from Reinhard’s forehead. 

“I pulled it down and tried to rend it in half, but the sky has no seams,” Reinhard continued. He looked at Kircheis, his eyes fever bright. If his temperature didn’t go down by tomorrow, Kircheis thought, he’d carry Reinhard to the infirmary himself. “There’s nowhere to tear.” 

“It’s alright,” Kircheis soothed. “Just rest, Lord Reinhard.”

“The stars are different up close, Kircheis,” Reinhard warned. “They’re not the same.” 

“Just rest,” Kircheis repeated. Reinhard’s words were nonsensical, almost ephemeral, but their strange romanticism made Kircheis fond all the same. He smiled, feeling emboldened, tucking some stray, sweaty hair behind Reinhard’s ear. He continued, “Just sleep, Lord Reinhard. That’s all you fever needs.” 

Reinhard listened, closing his eyes and relaxing minutely. But it was several long minutes before his breathing evened out and Kircheis trusted that he had fallen asleep. Kircheis watched him quietly, occasionally brushing a cloth across his forehead or making senseless, soothing sounds when Reinhard would toss restlessly in his sleep. 

Kircheis studied Reinhard’s face curiously, noting the line of his jaw, the gentle curl of his hair. Reinhard had been beautiful when Kircheis met him, strange and shining and intense even as a child. As he grew, so too did the severity of his beauty, as it crystalized into something stunning and icy and cold. And Reinhard’s nature had calcified, too, turned pointed, oriented toward the endless sky. 

And at some point something else had changed too. The way Kircheis was cast against Reinhard, the referentiality of himself to the center. When they had been small and more vulnerable, and Kircheis pulled Reinhard away from fights not for himself but others, he had hardly felt like a protector. It hadn’t been true then, not like people claimed it had; it was more true now.

But he could sense it, the way eyes sometimes passed over him without seeing, only looking toward Reinhard, to that bright future he possessed inside himself that grew increasingly difficult to ignore.

And behind him, fixed in place like a shadow, Kircheis could watch that shining light, protect it. He could do that, he knew.