Chapter Text
The day of the Dalton Winter Club Fair always was on the first Saturday after winter break ended. While many students had chosen their extra-curricular activities in the fall, some changed or went out for new ones in the spring. Thus there was the fair, giving students a picture of what else might be out there. It was also one of the best chances to catch up with each other and detox from the first week of classes. Blaine sat behind the Warbler’s Sign Up table, lamenting the fact he was on longer Mindanao, and out of the winter cold. The only thing that was good was he would be meeting Jeremiah for coffee as soon as this was over. Blaine smiled to himself and then turned that smile of Zaheer Ibrahim as he signed up for an audition in the following week.
“Thinking about a hot date?” Nick asked as he leaned down and signed his name to the 3:15 time slot on Monday for his audition.
“You know it,” Blaine replied easily.
“Who is it this week? Finally going to take pity on Hummel?”
“Kurt and I are just friends.”
“So you keep on saying.”
“I haven’t spoken with him since December.”
“Kind of hard to do when you were off over 10 time zones away. I didn’t see his name of the sign up sheet, has he not come by yet?”
“No, but the morning is young and he had to go back to Lima for that Friday night dinner thing he does with his parents.”
“He just became a boarding student and he still goes back to Lima once a week? That’s got to be hell for gas.”
“I guess. See you tomorrow for the Halo Tournament?”
“Bet on it,” Nick said with a wink as he walked away. The ‘Halo Tournament’ had been the code word the Dalton Fight Club had started to use when they had wanted to meet. It sounded innocent enough, and with the number of different gaming systems of Dalton’s Campus, no one got too suspicious when the Dalton Fight Club declined invitation to one of their ‘Halo Tournaments’. Blaine was personally looking forward to the next round of fight club. Perhaps Nick might sweat so much that he would be able to see through the wife-beater he wore…
The sound of a high laugh followed by rapid-fire French caught Blaine’s ear and prevented a tent from growing in his pants too much. He looked over to one side, and down the row Kurt was bent over the table for Dalton’s French Society, holding an easy conversation with Bernard Chevalier. Blaine thought he remembered Kurt at one time telling him that he enjoyed French. In the insanity that had followed Kurt’s transfer, Blaine hadn’t been surprised Kurt had missed out of finding the French Society. He was only half listening though. Languages had never been his strong suit, especially when the speakers were conversing as quickly as Bernard and Kurt.
“Well hello there,” a low tenor voice said, with a little bit of a growl at the end. “You must be Blaine, I’m Sebastian,” the other boy continued as he leaned across the table, signing his name with flourish on one of the Tuesday slots.
“Yeah, I am. Nice to meet you,” Blaine said flashing what he thought was his best smile as he looked into a pair of gray green eyes behind hair styled close to perfectly. When Sebastian extended his hand, Blaine took it, shivering just slightly at the way Sebastian’s fingers moved directly to the pulse point on his wrist. The smile on Sebastian’s lips was definitely that of a predator, and Blaine felt the tip of this tongue against his lips without having made the conscious decision to lick his lips.
“I can see why the council chose you to sit behind the table. With that smile of yours you could tempt even the straight boys,” Sebastian said with a wicked grin. Blaine felt himself flushing and began to stammer for a response.
“See you later, Tiger,” Sebastain said as he stood up and walked from the table, but not before he shot Blaine a last wink. As Blaine gathered himself he failed to notice that Kurt had seen everything and rather than walk directly to the Warbler table had headed to a table where a pairs of Sai, Tonfa, Butterfly Swords, and even Wushu Fans were crossed. Blaine didn’t notice the shock on Ryan Cho’s or Ian McNamara’s face as Kurt began talking with them. What he did finally notice was the look of respect on both their faces as Kurt gave them a bow from the waist, his left palm resting on the knuckles of his right fist. He failed to notice the determination in Kurt’s eyes as he walked to the table and signed his name right under Sebastian.
By the time Blaine had collected himself enough to ask Kurt about his winter break, Kurt had already moved on, talking with Ciaran Jones and Xavier De La Vega at Mock Trial. Blaine wondered why Kurt was making an effort to join so many extra curricular activities. After all, Kurt was only a sophomore. He shouldn’t start worrying about the college process this early. However, he decided not to focus on Kurt, nor what he was doing as Flint Wilson approached with a broad smile on his face. Blaine smiled back, and soon the two boys were exchanging stories about the tropical locals in which they had passed their holidays.
Early the next morning, Blaine was awakened from his rather erotic dream about Jeremiah sucking him off on a display window in the GAP by the ringing of his phone. He groped for it blindly and found it buzzing by his bedside. “What is it?” he asked, his voice still thick with sleep
“Dude,” it was David’s voice, and he was entirely too excited for whatever ungodly hour it was, “you have to get to the old gym now.”
“Why?”
“Just move your lazy ass,” David commanded before he hung up. Blaine slid on Cooper’s old Carnegie Mellon Sweat pants and didn’t bother fixing his hair as he slid on his sneakers. The last time David had been this excited was just after they had met and there had been a Maserati in the parking lot. Blaine wondered what it was this time, half absently as he jogged through the mostly empty hallways. People were either still asleep or perhaps already up. He knew that the soccer team was already starting conditioning and wondered if David had invited him to see the legendary winter streak.
“Where are you headed Tiger?” A slightly familiar voice came from behind him.
“Sebastian,” Blaine began as pleasantly as he could.
“Not running off to see a special someone?”
“Single.”
“Good,” Sebastian said with a leer as he moved a little bit closer. Blaine had turned though and pulled his vibrating phone from his pocket. He ignored the tone in Sebastian’s voice as he read a four word text from David, and sighed before he broke off into a run.
“What are you running towards?” Sebastian asked as began to jog a little.
“Don’t know, but apparently I won’t believe this,” Blaine shot back over his shoulder, wishing he hadn’t indulged in as many Mocha Sandwiches as he had over the break. Finally arriving at the gym, he saw David tapping his foot nervously. Before Blaine even had a chance to catch his breath, he was pulled by his wrist into the gym where he stopped breathing all together. He didn’t hear the door open behind him or Sebastian’s own breath catch in his throat. Instead he saw Kurt in mid air, wearing black silk, left arm out stretched and a curved sword held in his right, the curve of the weapon facing towards the ceiling.
Kurt was oblivious to the crowd by the door as he landed in a crouch, tip of the sword now point past his arm. He held the pose for a quarter of a second before his left foot shot behind his right and the blade swooped around his body, over his back, and head before sticking outwards and downwards with a whipping sound. Blaine stood transfixed as Kurt continued to move rapidly, the look of concentration, focus, and determination was not something he had seen before. He knew Kurt could be stubborn and that his eyes might flash, but this facial expression had taken that flash of the eye and applied it to the whole face. No matter how his body twisted and the sword flashed in the air, the look of concentration never left Kurt’s face, not even when he jumped up and his trailing foot shot back into a kick as he extended the sword in a rapid stab before he landed, spinning, movements too fast for the eye to catch.
The form continued, and Kurt’s movements were liquid smooth with impeccably crisp footwork. The only time he had seen something close to this was watching his cousin Eduardo who practiced Wushu, but Eduardo’s movements were never so crisp or so perfectly controlled. The wooden sword Eduardo had used in his practice had never seemed as much a part of his arm as the flashing blade now resting against Kurt’s palm was a part of him. Kurt moved seamlessly from the low stance, left shin resting on the ground by pushing his center higher and upwards before he rocked back and upwards, the curved sword swooping (what seemed to Blaine) dangerously close to Kurt’s occipital lobe.
“Told you that you needed to see this,” David whispered as Kurt entered another impossibly low stance, right leg extended so far that there were only inches between it and the ground. From there it was only a matter of seconds until the pattern closed, Kurt standing and transferring the sword from his right hand to his left with the same fluidic style he had used during the entire demonstration. “You missed him do some sort of crazy circle walking thing in which he spun and hands moved so fast I would have sworn that it was a different Kurt.”
“Where did he learn to do that?” Sebastian asked. Blaine had completely forgotten about him. His tone was as awestruck as Blaine felt.
“I don’t know,” Blaine answered simply. If Kurt was capable of doing that, of executing moves like that, he had a hard time imagining anyone, even Karofsky intimidating Kurt. The look on Kurt’s face alone would have been able to turn away anyone. Kurt now sitting on one of the bleachers as he watched Brain den Adel began a pattern. Blaine was still trying to work through the cognitive gap between the Kurt he had seen moving on the floor like he belonged in some sort of action movie and the high spirited Counter-Tenor who had dared to audition with a solo from Evita. He couldn’t make the connection. Sebastian however had moved from the small knot at the doorway and strode over to the bleachers with no hesitation at all.
Blaine had connected himself enough to see the way Sebastian leaned into Kurt’s space and the cool reserve with which Kurt responded to the other boy’s introduction. He saw as the predatory leer on Sebastian’s face transformed almost instantly to a smile of delight and the way that his hands began to become animated. Kurt’s expression changed to from careful neutrality to pleasant surprise and mild amusement. Kurt stood and made a gesture with his hand and the two of them walked off, as not to disturb Brian as he went through his routine. Blaine watched in amusement as Kurt nodded to one of Sebastian’s questions and the animation in Sebastian grew ever more intense. Brian den Adel finished and Ryan Cho took the floor. Kurt and Sebastian though kept on talking.
It took another three members of the Dalton Martial Arts Club Before their conversation wound down. When it did, Sebastian rested his hand casually on Kurt’s back as they walked towards where David and Blaine stood. Kurt shrugged it off lightly, but Sebastian rather than seem irritated about it just chuckled slightly, gave Kurt's shoulder a friendly half shove, and sent a sort of half salute before he walked towards Blaine and David.
“So did you find out where Kurt learned all that?” David asked as soon as Sebastian had returned to the group.
“His mom was Elizabeth Stowell,” Sebastian explained simply.
“Who?” Blaine asked.
“Liz Stonewall?” Sebastian tried raising an eyebrow. Blaine shrugged in reply. The name sounded vaguely familiar, but he wasn’t able to place it. David on the other hand had a look of astonishment on his face.
“You know,” David said after a long pause, “I can kind of see it.”
“You really can,” Sebastian said as he turned his head back to look at the bleachers.
“Who is Liz Stonewall?” Blaine asked, still trying to figure out what was going on.
“You, my friend,” David said as he put a hand on Blaine’s back, “have much to learn, and it’s high time for you to be educated. Don’t worry though, you’ll be free before you have to go to your Halo Tournament.”