Chapter Text
The church bells rang eleven hours into the morning, though the people on the train station landing may have thought it eleven at night for how the summer storms darkened the sky. A deluge fell on the poor pedestrians, who all hurried from awning to awning beneath umbrellas and hoods, gazes downcast, squinting against the rain. It was too humid for the rain to be refreshing as it should have been toward the end of a hot summer.
A young man of eighteen huffed as he leaned over the back of a cart, hurriedly arranging tarps to cover his wares. His horse, a chestnut ardennes, flicked her ears irritably against the raindrops, but otherwise waited patiently for her owner to come to his senses and take them out of the downpour. But he was too focused on saving the items in the cart to worry about getting themselves out of the rain just yet. There were pallets of fresh apples, and jars of smooth apple butters, and ciders a brilliant gold, and pies sweetly spiced, and even some graceful wood carvings the boy had done with his own knives, in case any passersby wanted an ornament to give to a loved one.
And there was the safe he kept the money in, all cash, tucked in the back where nobody could steal his earnings. The sales were going well up until the rain started, and now nobody had the patience to stop by a poor farmer and purchase an apple, as they were too busy fleeing from the storm.
He called out anyway after he was certain the goods were protected from the rain. “Apples! Fresh Harveston apples!” Although he needn’t explain where from—anyone listening to his heavy accent could tell he came from the pastorals up north.
Fast-paced footsteps were all the warning the farmer had before a stranger, blinded by the storm, ran into him and knocked him down. He hit the cart, jostling the goods on his way down, where he ended up sprawled in a puddle with a scraped elbow. “Hey! Watch where yer goin’, ya boar!”
When he looked up to see who had knocked him down, the farmer was briefly taken aback by the visage of the young man standing above him. His blond hair shone even under the shade of his umbrella, framing a face almost unearthly in its beauty. He was tall, and poised, and dressed in rich fabrics that practically shouted his wealth.
In contrast the farmer looked quite the pathetic sight, soaked and kneeling in what might well be dirty gutter water. The stranger made no attempt to hide his disgust, stepping away as if the farmer was poisonous. “Who sets up shop in the middle of a station platform? You had better take your business elsewhere, lest you continue to offend the eyes of the gentile here.” His violet eyes drifted over the farmer as he picked himself off the ground, muttering about his soaked-through pants and catching a cold. “Though, a wash of rain might serve to improve your looks by revealing what you look like beneath that coat of mud.”
Though the stranger may look angelic, his personality was anything but.
(Meanwhile, this minor commotion drew the keen eyes of another blond who had just hopped off the train.)
“If any a’ my stuff’s broken, as sure as Mount Moln is tall yer payin’ fer it!”
“Absolutely not.”
“It’s only fair!”
At this moment the man who had spotted them announced his approach by laying a palm upon the rude stranger’s arm, chirping out a bright "Bonjour!"
The other startled, jumping back and swinging his umbrella defensively. But upon seeing who had just greeted him, he relaxed, and even the coldness in his eyes warmed a bit. “Rook? What are you doing here?”
“Vil, dear, don’t harrass the poor peddler. He doesn’t know better.”
“He ran into me,” the ‘peddler’ growled.
“I would not have ran into anybody if you respected the busy schedules of everyone here and set up your barrow somewhere out of the way.” Once again, Vil’s eyes bore into the farmer, but the boy would not be cowed. He stood to his full stature and stubbornly glared back. Vil sighed and turned back to Rook, spoke as if they had no audience. “He only has himself to blame for his sorry circumstances. Despite all that grime I can see the makings of a comely gentleman.”
“He has a certain rugged beauté about him,” Rook agreed with a delighted smile.
“If he put in more effort to maintain his appearance, he could even have a future as an actor. Then he would not need to labor in the dirt and shout himself hoarse trying to sell fruits.”
The farmer’s frown grew more severe the longer those two talked, his temper rising. It was a relief when they began to wander away, though they did not stray far enough out of earshot for him to ignore their conversation. He didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but…
“Oh, but it is a wonderful surprise to see you here, beau Vil.”
“I just got off the train. I’m staying at a lovely resort for a little pre-gala vacation. It is close enough to the city, so I planned to stay here and take a cab if I had need to visit those bustling streets.”
“I was just about to get on the train and take it to the city.”
“If you’d like, you may stay with me. My suite has enough room for the both of us.”
“Of course! I’d love nothing more than to room with you. All the better for us to catch up, isn’t it? What fortune to have met you here—! The winds of this storm have carried our sails to this time and place so that our paths may cross.”
Vil chuckled affectionately, as if spouting strange poetry at random was an expected part of conversation. “Come, let’s get out of this rain. I see my cab over there.”
The two strange men left, and the farmer found himself alone in the rain. He lifted the tarps and was dismayed to find one of the apple pallets fell onto another. The ones below would surely bruise, and who wanted to buy an ugly apple? Never mind that they still tasted refreshingly sweet, as their defects were only surface-deep. People seldom look past first appearances when making judgements about… apples.
Well, these could make good juice. The farmer made a mental note to sort them into the juicing barrels once he got home.
It had already been a long day for him, as he had left his village before the sun rose to take his horse and wagon to the city. With the rain looking like it wouldn’t let up soon, the sky an imposing grey as far as the eye could see, he decided he’d pack up and leave.
“Let’s go,” he urged the horse.
On the ride back, his mind kept circling back to the confrontation on the platform. Oh, but it made his blood boil! Who did those guys think they were, talking down on him like that? He doubted either of them had ever worked a day in their lives. If they knew what real labor was, they wouldn’t condescend so terribly.
Still…
“It sure would be lovely to be treated like a gentleman,” he mused aloud, wistful. To be called “sir,” to afford a cab whenever he wanted to go anywhere, to be welcomed instead of shunned in the city, to live a comfortable life. Not that he minded living in Harveston, mind you. He loved his little village. But funds were tight.
Most concerningly, the family orchard wasn’t doing too good. A disease had struck the weaker trees. The upcoming autumn harvest wasn’t going to be as bountiful as it had been in prior years. And the farmer was having a hard time keeping up with the maintenance of his ailing orchard, since he lived with just his grandparents and they weren’t as fit today as they’d been in youth.
His grandparents worked hard, did what they were capable of doing, but the job of climbing up ladders to dizzying heights, pruning the branches and picking the apples at harvest-time, sorting the crates, and riding to neighboring towns to sell them… this was the duty of Epel Felmier.