In theory, Nikolas was supposed to share his room with Richan and Guigo, but Richan was away attending a preparatory school, to prepare him for whatever his future wife would want in a husband, and Guigo was never seen without Diasa. The twins had a knack of finding the most remote nook and cranny in the house and even their mother had given up on ordering them to stay in their beds. His other sisters all bundled together in their own rooms, Viola with Sanna and Lianne, Felie with Ada in their nursery. He could hear them giggling well into the night, only stopped by their housekeeper when the man bothered to get out of bed. Brytha, of course, was the only one with a proper room to herself, for she was the woman of the house, and would take over the family business.

So Nikolas was left to the silence of his own thoughts most nights. Except… he sat up, frowning when a soft knock came on the door. It wasn't Guigo, Guigo never knocked on principle, he would barge in, probably to brag about what he and Diasa had gotten themselves into. It was too late in the evening for his father to knock, and his mother hadn't returned from her trip to the palace to report to the Tsaritsa. In any case, she wouldn't disturb him so late in the night. Nikolas got out of bed, tip-toeing towards the door.

"Who is it?" he said, cautiously.

"Jozin," said Jozin and Nikolas nearly jumped out of his skin, for it sounded like Jozin was standing right next to him even though he was on the other side of the door. "May I come in?"

"There's nothing much," Nikolas said, even as he opened the door and gestured for Jozin to come in.

Jozin didn't come alone. There was a Rytsar with him, a tall broad shouldered man with a graying beard and hair, though his hair was hidden in the furred cap they all wear.

"It's Valdi," said Jozin, proudly, gesturing towards the man, "Valdi said it wasn't nice just sneaking around by myself."

Valdi looked unimpressed, Nikolas observed, "Would you like to come in as well?" he asked, more out of politeness than anything. "It's warmer inside." It was true, all the bedrooms had fireplaces, or, in the case of his parents' room, a witch-made iron stove that always kept their room warm.

The older man glanced at Jozin, who shrugged, "You said you didn't care to hear children talking."

"It is not my duty to know."

"Ah," Jozin turned to Nikolas, rolling his eyes. "Valdi is so funny. But you'll complain tomorrow when your bones ache or something. Come in so you can listen to us talk."

Jozin talked about Valdi in very familial tones, Nikolas thought, wondering if they were related. Sometimes it was the case in the far off places of Icfeld, and it was a way to maintain loyalty, his father had explained to Brytha. Nikolas could only guess that she had nodded very solemnly and stored the information away in the vast cavern that was her head.

"Do you want to… sit on my bed?" Nikolas suggested, "I don't know anywhere else…" He didn't have any chairs in the bedroom.

Jozin glanced around curiously, "Is it strange sharing a room with others? Well, when they're here at least?"

"Not really."

"Hm," Jozin sat on the bed, no, bounced onto it. "It is strange for me. Your family is so big!"

"Not any bigger than any other!"

"In Skapina this is considered very big," Jozin nodded. "They don't have more than two or three, right, Valdi?"

The older man nodded, and looked as if he very much wanted to sleep in Guigo's bed instead of standing watch.

"My brother's not sleeping in here tonight," Nikolas offered, seeing Jozin's speculative look.

"Did your mother make this?" Jozin said curiously, running his hand on the quilt covering Nikolas's bed.

"No."

"Hm. Well, my mother doesn't do quilting either, that's not her specialty. I think my grandmother made mine, but she's not related to me you know, we all call the older women grandmother—" as he spoke Jozin casted discreet looks at Valdi, whose eyelids began to flutter. "There are so many of them! I only told you about the one with the white bears but there's one who has a house on animal legs, well, it was a fox's the last time I saw her, but she told me she wanted to try a rooster's legs because roosters wake up earlier than foxes and she always liked—" He continued in such a manner until they heard a snore from Valdi, to which he gave a relieved sigh. "I thought he would never go away."

"He wanted to come with you didn't he?"

"Yes!" Jozin threw up his hands in exasperation. "I told him we're in the same house, a big house, but it's not like a palace where he can't find me. And it's not like I am going off into the town by myself, it's not like there are wizards here anyway."

Well, that was very different to what his father told him, but perhaps the Masteritsa called magic users wizards, who was Nikolas to say which fancy words the grown-ups chose to call things? "What did you want to tell me?"

"Ah," Jozin frowned, he rocked back and forth on his bed before whispering. "I am a boy, you know, I am always a boy. Even if the grandmothers say that I am sort of a girl. My mother says they say that because they think girls do their kind of magic better." Seeing Nikolas's confused look he said, "It's something in Skapina. Dragon magic, you know? No? Well, dragons aren't male or female, they're sort of both, and the grandmothers said that dragons were in Skapina long before they were, so their magic just," he waved his hand around, "bleeds everywhere, and it makes people like me."

"Magic makes people?"

"Dragon magic is funny," Jozin said solemnly. "So they told me I'm like, something in the middle, not like a boy or a girl, but I told them they're wrong and I'm a boy. My mother lets me choose but she said it's easier to just say I'm a girl in Icfeld."

"Skapina is very confusing," Nikolas concluded. Then he decided he might as well enlighten himself, "What is witch magic? My mother does some magic as well but she doesn't tell me."

"Well, first of all, everyone can do magic," Jozin said, sounding very much like the Masteritsa. "Wizards just do it differently from witches. Like…" he glanced around and his eyes settled on Guigo's unfinished breakfast from the morning. "Like cooking, you see? When a wizard does something, they'll go around and around following a book. They'll," here Jozin squinted his eyes and pretended to scratch a non-existent beard, "follow everything to the letter. The temperature, the ingredients, how long they have to cook it. But a witch would just do it. She just knows the recipe."

"That sounds good," Nikolas agreed.

"It does, doesn't it?" Jozin frowned, crossing his arms, "But I don't like saying that because then they all insisted I must be a witch."

"Can't you not be both?" said Nikolas.

Jozin narrowed his eyes, "You're not joking?"

"No?"

"Hm. They all hated wizards, the grandmothers. They all said it was—" here Jozin made his voice high and snappish, "balderdash and wishy-washy!" Then he grinned at Nikolas, "I like your idea, that didn't occur to my mother, and she's very clever about things. But it makes sense, she doesn't like wizards either."