Laurent Kieren was like many of his fellow students at Brunnhold; sometimes he had to bring his books with him to lunch. Also like many of his fellow students, just because he brought his books to lunch, didn’t mean he particularly wanted to read them. After a morning of classes, the young galdor wasn’t keen on stretching his brain anymore. As dedicated as he was, it really did seem fair that he should have a chance to rest his brain for an hour before he returned to his studies.

So, while he had quite a bit to do in the satchel at his side, the student looked around rather hopefully for a familiar face to pass the time for lunch, instead. Never the most subtle or graceful, his attempts to spot a place to sit were quite obvious as he took advantage of slight height to bounce up on the balls of his feet and look around over and around the heads of other students.

Forgetting he was carrying food, he started to reach up and push his thin-rimmed spectacles up his pointed nose, only remembering at the last minute and scrambling to maintain his hold on everything. Muttering a few choice curses under his breath, he resettled his burden, proud that he hadn’t dropped everything on the floor of the cafeteria. Again.

Athrym poked at the gelatinous blob on her plate. The cook had tried something different for lunch today. A Terrain? Terine? Something starting with T. It was layered with meat and roasted vegetables and all held together with fatty juices - cold and intersting looking. But it just didn't seem...right. The blonde had thought it would be nice, a change, great with bread...but now that it stared at her from the white of her plate, she wasn't sure she wanted to touch it.

Looking up at the other students, anything to look away from the terror of her lunch, she noticed a lanky student fumble with his lunch, pushing up thin framed glasses. What was with all the clumsy students in the lunchroom? She could see the student was looking for a table...a friendly face. With some sort of peverted attempt to be the social good girl, Athrym flashed a quick smile at the boy, nodding to the empty table around her.

That was the acceptable thing to do. It wasn't her table after all.

Nauleth didn't notice any subtle invitations to his table, so preoccupied with other thoughts as he wove his way between a few underclassmen with a sneer to slide into the seat next to Athrym. He offered something of a sheepish, lopsided, distracted grin as the various lunch selections on his tray settled—a kind of secretly pleased expression that might have been almost goofy to the outside observer.

"Well, hello, Mis—Ath. Adventurous with your lunch, I see." The dark-eyed boy teased, glancing at her plate before looking around their vicinity, pretending to let the nearby student (someone from his hall? his year, at least ...) go unnoticed for the moment.

"I wasn't willing to touch ... that."

Athrym turned her head at the dark eyed boys approach, smiling as he sat beside her. Looking down at the plate of meaty jelly, she poked it with her fork again.

"I know...I shouldn't have, but it sort of looked appeared tasty. Then I realized its cold. And its wobbily. And its...clocks...it probably tastes okay but it looks revolting." Eyes straying to his plate, she poked his own meal with her fork.

"Wanna trade?"

Laurent had been looking for a friendly face to sit with. When the friendly expression came from a certain blonde, he felt his hopefulness dissipate, replaced by a nervous suspicion that he was walking into what was going to be an unpleasant lunch. Unfortunately, when she’d caught his eye, Laurent had automatically flashed back a friendly smile to Athrym; now he couldn’t even pretend he hadn’t seen her.

Contemplating his tray for a moment, he weighed what might be worse, being the brunt of a joke during lunch, or setting himself up for other unpleasantness later. Reminding himself that he wasn’t nearly so cowardly as he had been a few years ago, Laurent squared his shoulders and headed for the table. By the time he had gotten there, the addition of Nauleth made sitting down an even more intimidating prospect, and his mind was running in a little circle of ‘what are they playing at?’.

Coming up to the table, he moved to set his tray down, giving a friendly smile, “Good afternoon. Mind if I join you?” even as he asked the question, he was slipping into a seat. Which was when the very logical explanation for the ‘invitation’ became clear. Clocks. She’d been nodding at someone behind him, hadn’t she? Well, too late now. Food. They seemed to have been talking about the food, that was a nice safe subject, “Oh, I don’t know. I thought the… blobby food looked fascinating,” he added, his smile a little strained at the edges.

(( sorry for the delay. i've been... really, really afk lately. ))

Nauleth had opened his mouth to answer Athrym when he noticed movement out of the corner of his eye. Peripheral vision was much more efficient now that his hair wasn't constantly in his face, and so he was already examining the interloper as soon as Laurent spoke.

He blinked and said nothing for a moment, sharp features tightening into an expression that appeared rather unfavorable toward any social opportunity for the other student. Still not entirely open to sharing the table with just anyone, and yet unwilling to reproduce anymore explosive lunch misadventures at this juncture in his Brunnhold career, Naul seemed to hover in indecisive silence for longer than would normally be polite.

The dark-eyed boy coughed and glanced back at the blonde's food before offering a cautious (but not discouraging) response, "Fascinating is not the word I would've chosen for it, but I suppose it's fitting. I don't know if I'd want to study it, however."

He didn't smile, but didn't quite give permission. He might've been waiting for a second opinion from Athrym.

Athrym looked at the newcomer and offered her quick social smile again. This was the right thing to do...right? Her pale eyes flickered from him to Naul, before going to her food again.

"I thought it would be good." She said again softly, poking it with her fork before finally turning to wholesome, solid beans on the other side of the plate. Beans, at least, she could understand. They didn't wobble. Stabbing one, she looked up at the boy.

"Sure, take a seat..." She left the end open, obviously a prompt for a name. The blonde's eyed Naul - unsure of what he thought. Didn't he want her to be more...normal? Gently, under the table, she kicked his ankle to get his attention, her face seeming to say 'be nice'.

Laurent gave himself permission to sigh slightly as he hesitated, hands still on his tray as if he were considering picking it back up and fleeing. Hesitantly, he flashed Nauleth his best uncertainly friendly smile. Now he was more convinced than ever that there was something going on here that he was missing out on, but now it made him curious. The bookish youth had spent no little time being tormented by his peers, and it made him a little shy of unexpected friendliness.

“Well, it’s always good to be open to trying new things. Never know when it might come in useful, and it keeps things… inter…esting.” He trailed off, realizing that he was babbling. “Laurent Kieren, miss…?” he said with another friendly grin. His tablemates were fairly recognizable faces, but total cluelessness was a safer strategy.

Diplomatically, he said, “If I’m taking up someone’s seat, I can be on my way in a few minutes. “ He bumped his elbow against the strap of his bag, “The days seem to get shorter, the farther I get in classes.” There, that was one thing all the students at Brunhold had in common; the workload of studies.

Athrym popped the bean into her mouth and shook her head.

"No, there isn't anyone to be expected. This is a very quiet table." She said crypticly, before offering another smile. Very sociable of her.

"Bruthgrave, Miss Athrym Bruthgrave. And I know what you mean. I feel like Golightly is just giving us more and more to do as the year gets shorter. Why, just yesterday, he gave us another assignment...on top of the one we already have for phosphorous mechanics! I mean, I feel like I'm getting my phosphourus mixed with my biology! Golightly be damned if I accidently end up creating glowing blistleberries or something!" She laughed a little, looking at him through the white of her fringe. It felt good to whinge about school. It was something new.

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance,” Laurent said, truthfully. Sitting at a table wasn’t really conducive to bowing, so he settled for just starting to pick at his own lunch. “I think I’ve figured it out,” he said, conversationally, “Melles is working the whole class into a coma. The final is probably going to be reviving each other,” he lowered his voice slightly, adopting a vaguely conspiratorial tone. Apparently following that train of thought, he mused, “I wonder if you fail if the person trying to revive you just makes you just makes you lose your lunch instead ….” Behind his spectacles, his eyes glittered with amusement, and his shoulders relaxed slightly as his nerves faded somewhat.

Athrym laughed a little, stabbing another bean and popping it in her mouth. Looking at Naul, she chuckled again.

"That would be an intersting final. Messy, but interesting. Although, this year I have seen enough lost lunches to last a lifetime." She shuddered a little, then looked at Laurent. He seemed like a nice enough person, probably why she'd never met him before. This social stuff wasn't so bad.

"So, do you have a major at the moment? I'm more intersted in Living myself."

None of Sorelle's friends were visible in the crowded lunch hall. She glanced rather half-heartedly over the horde of faces before deciding that even if she did spot them, she might not find a spot at their table, and instead it might be more worthwhile just finding an empty seat and broadening her social circle, whether the table was occupied by people she knew already or not.

The first empty seat she spotted was on a table occupied by three older students. They already looked mismatched enough - one gawky, nervous-looking student, one icy blonde, and one dark boy who she'd heard strange rumours about. Something about how he tried to kill someone and it backlashed... or something. Sorelle shook back her ginger curls and decided that they couldn't mind one more stranger.

Ignoring the terrine of doubtful sophistication (however the cook tried...) which she was carrying, she flounced over as though she had every reason in the world to go and sit with these people, chirped "Hello!" and sat down. She began to eat her lunch.