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"You have to kiss me back," Tlory announced, and Guylian nearly choked as Tlory curled his fingers in
Macati's collar and yanked him close.

Macati obviously hesitated again, but Guylian saw the moment he gave in and kissed Tlory carefully, like he  was afraid Tlory might take offense or bite him, which, well, that probably wasn't outside the realm of  possibility. Tlory seemed like a biter. Guylian flushed a little, a warm, pleasant feeling unfurling in his  stomach as he watched them.

"All right, enough of that," Macati said, pushing Tlory away. They were both slightly flushed, and Tlory  smirked, looking completely pleased with himself.

"This is still a bad idea," Macati said, tearing his hands through his hair in agitation. "I can't teach you  and—and—"

"Bed us?" Tlory asked, still smirking. He reached out and tugged Guylian a few steps closer to Macati,  draping himself over Guylian's shoulders. Guylian blinked, a little startled by Tlory's quick turnaround.

"Yes," Macati said quietly, sighing. He didn't continue for a moment, just looked tired and frustrated and
Guylian shifted a little closer to Tlory. He hadn't meant to make this… it really wasn't that awful, was it?
"It's not conducive to giving you a safe, sheltering environment to learn in."

"Then why would Nathan say it would be okay?" Guylian asked, confused. Nathan had been a teacher  before.

"Yeah, and," Tlory said, shifting his hip comfortably against Guylian's. "I'd feel much more trusting  knowing you have a… vested interest in keeping me around."

"That's not—Tlory," Macati said exasperatedly. "I'm not going to get rid of you. And I don't know what
Nathan was thinking, Guylian. He knows better."

"Yeah, well, I'd believe you if you kissed me again," Tlory said, turning his head and pressing his lips to
Guylian's temple. Guylian flushed, fighting the urge to squirm. He had started it, after all. "Or you could let
Guylian molest you some more. It's kind of hot when he gets all forward."

"Tlory," Guylian said reprovingly, his face on fire.

"He wants to," Tlory stressed, and Guylian didn't have to look at him to know he was scowling. "But he's  being stubborn for no good reason."

"You can't make him," Guylian said, a little wistfully.

"Why not?" Tlory asked, sounding a little petulant, and Guylian had to smile a little. At least he had Tlory  in his corner, even if he was at a loss for how to convince Macati.

"Look, as your teacher, I'm in a position where I can exert undue influence over you," Macati said,  frowning. "I don't want to take advantage of either of you."

Tlory snorted, but Guylian spoke up before he could, cutting off whatever dismissive comment Tlory had  on the tip of his tongue.

"You wouldn't," Guylian said quietly, leaning closer to Tlory. Tlory grumbled something wordlessly.
"You're not—you're a good person."
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"Yeah, a bad person would have already dragged us off to his bedroom," Tlory added unhelpfully. Macati  sighed, tearing his hands through his hair and looking torn.

"If I agree to this—if—there will be rules," Macati said slowly, narrowing his eyes at Tlory when he opened  his mouth. Tlory obligingly shut up and Guylian smothered a smile. "There will be no funny business—"

"Funny business?" Tlory cut in, apparently unable to help himself. Guylian elbowed him in the side,  making him quiet down again.

"No funny business in the work room," Macati said firmly. "We're all sleeping in separate rooms. I'll still  convert the parlor; Tlory, you'll sleep in there. Guylian, you'll stay upstairs still."

Guylian nodded—that sounded less hypothetical than he was sure Macati meant it.

"Anything else?" Tlory asked, almost sweetly.

"You have to trust me," Macati said, staring at Tlory. "You have to tell me if your mother starts pressuring  you again."

Tlory tensed, then gave a terse nod. "That it?"

"I reserve the right to add rules," Macati said, sighing. "But you two can add them, too. Within reason."

"Good," Tlory said, nudging Guylian forward, towards Macati. "I'm sure we can come up with lots of fun  rules."

Guylian stumbled to a stop in front of Macati, fidgeting a minute. "You're sure?" He asked quietly, not  really able to believe that this was actually happening. He was supposed to be kicked out, sent packing back  to Nathan's, not… actually part of a three-way relationship.

His aunt would probably be laughing at him right now.

"Yeah, I'm sure," Macati said, smiling faintly. "I—I should say no, Guylian. It would be better—easier. But
I suppose that's not really how that works; we don't do things the simple way, do we?"

"Simple is boring?" Guylian suggested, flushing a little.

"I'm instituting a rule," Tlory said, shoving Guylian again. "If I shove you at him, you have to kiss him, not  talk to him."

Guylian turned his head and made a face at Tlory, distracted when Macati drew his attention back with a  soft touch to his chin.

"I like that rule," Macati admitted, and then kissed him gently. Guylian went with it, twining his arms  loosely around Macati's neck and returning the kiss. Macati pulled back after a moment, giving Guylian a  playful smile before turning him with gentle, guiding hands and nudging him towards Tlory.

Tlory grinned, his eyes bright, and tugged him close to make good on his rule. Guylian kissed back  fervently, deciding hazily that it really hadn't been such a stupid idea after all.
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Epilogue


Macati finished writing the last words of the spell with a small flourish, smiling as he set down his pen.
Glancing up automatically to check on Tlory and Guylian, Macati rolled his eyes at the sight that greeted  him.  

They were sitting on the other side of the long work table, closer to the stairs than Macati was. He'd  purposefully sat farther from them, to keep from being distracted as he finished the spell he was working  on.

Tlory had obviously taken advantage of his distance and scooted his chair close to Guylian's. It could have  been Guylian, but he was usually better than Tlory about following Macati's rule of no play in the work  room.

Guylian was usually better than Macati at following that rule, too.

Tlory was snickering and Guylian's face was flushed, so Macati highly doubted they were doing an actual  lesson in Civomic like he'd set them to.

"Say it again," Tlory demanded, and Macati revised his opinion as Guylian obligingly said something quietly  in Civomic. Nothing Macati recognized, and from the way Guylian's face reddened, it was something not  at all spell-related.

Tlory tried repeating it, but he mispronounced something and Guylian started to laugh.

"What?" Tlory asked, sneaking a furtive look at Macati. Macati raised his eyebrows, but Tlory just grinned.
"Guylian's teaching me new words."

"Is he," Macati said, capping his ink bottle as Guylian shrugged a shoulder, smiling shyly.

"Tlory just learned how to say, 'I would like to sleep with your roasted pheasant,'" Guylian said with a  straight face. Macati laughed as Tlory spluttered, shutting his current grimoire and standing up. He  resettled in the seat across from them, tidying the stack of spell circles Tlory had been working on earlier.

"What else have you taught him?" Macati asked, wondering if he could find a book on naughty Civomic  phrases. Just to see Guylian's face when he read them out loud.

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"Um," Guylian said, flushing anew. "Vocabulary. Spell vocabulary."

"Like what?" Macati pressed, wondering if he could get Guylian to admit he'd been slacking.

"Um," Guylian said, obviously at a loss. Tlory snickered, bumping his shoulder against Guylian's.

"For sex spells," Tlory said cheerfully. Guylian shook his head mutely, but he didn't deny it out loud so  he'd probably just been teaching Tlory dirty words.

"Tlory wants to do his pixie spell," Guylian said instead, obviously hoping to distract him. Macati paused  for a moment, keeping a straight face as Guylian squirmed in his seat.

"All right, let me see it," Macati said, making a note to find his lone volume of sex spells and leave it where
Tlory could find it.

Tlory nodded, getting up from his seat gracefully. He wandered over to the far end of the table and pulled  out a few pages of paper, which he brought back to Macati with a smile.

Macati skimmed through the spell quickly, relatively assured of its posterity simply because Guylian had  helped Tlory with it. Most spell mishaps were caused just from improperly structuring Civomic sentences.

"Try it," Macati said, handing the papers back. Tlory grinned, quick and fleeting, and Guylian spoke the  few short words to end the null spell they'd been practicing under.

Tlory fidgeted for a moment before sitting down next to Guylian again. He frowned at the paper for a long  moment before starting to speak it.

It took him a while—Tlory was getting much better at casting. Part of it was Guylian's influence, but part  of it was also the regular conversations in Civomic that Macati made sure they had. That had been
Nathan's suggestion, but it was a good one. It helped Tlory practice, it made Guylian happy, and Macati  had learned more new Civomic words than he had since he'd been an apprentice.

Tlory didn't falter once during the spell, unlike Guylian's mishap. Tlory's pixie had darker skin than Blake  and Kysera, but his hair was the same shockingly bright orange that Blake's was—Tlory had, for whatever  reason, taken strongly to the color. The pattern on the pixie's wings was much more complicated than the  other pixie's; that had been the biggest change to the spell and the hardest to accomplish.

The pixie stared at Tlory for a long moment, fluttering its wings experimentally. Tlory stared back, studying  it critically. Then the pixie suddenly whirled, peering at Macati curiously for a few seconds before turning  to stare at Guylian. Then it meowed plaintively and Macati started to laugh.

"You gave him a cat's voice?" Guylian asked, his eyes wide.

"Yep," Tlory said, looking rather pleased with himself. The pixie meowed again, then growled, knocking  himself over in his surprise at the noise. Macati snickered, and then whistled loudly, startling Guylian and  earning a dark look from Tlory. Tlory's pixie twisted its head to glower at him, and Macati had to smother  another laugh.

Blake came tumbling out of the nest, apparently shoved by Kysera, whose head poked out of the nest.

"What are you going to name him?" Guylian asked quietly as Blake flew down to the table. He shot Macati  a disdainful look, also not pleased by the whistle. He landed awkwardly a few inches from the new pixie.
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"Shalthariamus," Tlory declared. Macati shook his head, because really, only Tlory would come up with  such a difficult name. "But Shal for short."

Blake hooted inquisitively at Shal, not looking particularly thrilled by having another pixie around. Shal  stared back for a moment before walking right up to Blake. He mewed softly and Blake gave him an  uncertain look before hooting again. Shal smiled brightly, showing off tiny, perfect teeth, and then started  to purr.

"Huh," Tlory said, leaning closer. "He purrs."

Guylian giggled, covering his mouth with a hand as Kysera finally tumbled out of the nest in a tangle of  wings and limbs. He straightened himself out after a foot or two, and headed straight for Guylian despite  his obvious interest in Shal.

"Hi," Guylian greeted quietly, letting Kysera land gracelessly in his cupped hands.

"So, I did good?" Tlory prompted. He grinned at Macati, obviously wanting to enact the latest rule he'd  tacked on, and Macati wondered why he'd ever thought letting Tlory make rules was a good idea.

"Well," Macati hedged. "You'll have to wait a few days. Just to make sure he doesn't unravel. He hasn't  even flown yet."

"He's not going to unravel," Tlory said, making a face at him. "You just don't want to pay up."

"I'll pay," Macati said mildly, smiling slowly. Guylian flushed, then leaned over and pressed a quick kiss to  the corner of Tlory's mouth.

"I've paid," he said, setting Kysera on the table carefully. Blake hooted at him reprovingly, probably for  shoving him from the nest, but Kysera ignored him.

"Maybe half," Tlory said, wrinkling his nose at Guylian. "That wasn't a real kiss, so it doesn't count."

Guylian moved quickly, repeating the kiss but catching Tlory mostly on the chin. "There's the other half,  then."

Tlory spluttered for half a second, but Guylian just smiled brightly and scooted his chair a few inches away  as though it would really make Tlory keep his distance if he was inclined to pursue the matter.

"Fine," Tlory said, heaving an aggrieved sigh. He turned to Macati expectantly as Shal took flight, following
Kysera and Blake towards the nest in the skylight. "Well?"

"All right, but if he does disintegrate, you're going to have to issue a refund," Macati said thoughtfully.

"I don't know, that might be tough," Tlory said sarcastically, then turned and stole a kiss from Guylian  before Guylian had a chance to do more than look startled. Tlory shifted in his seat so he wasn't at such an  awkward angle, deepening the kiss as Guylian let out a soft, familiar noise of encouragement.

"There, now you've paid," Tlory said with satisfaction as he pulled back. Guylian blinked, looking a little  dazed, and Macati would never really tire of the way they both looked after sharing kisses. He turned back  to Macati, slouching in his seat and kicking Macati's ankle beneath the table. "Well?"

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