The middle class baths

You were honestly a little surprised Vatarie didn't pop out of the upper class baths and abduct you as you and Edin walk past its door. When you slotted in your key stone and entered the middle class baths you were also surprised by the difference.

There was no long corridor for private changing room just a short horizontal one with a door at each end. One for men one for women. You find the difference between the classes a little funny. It seemed such a dramatic reduction in privacy that whoever had designed it could only have done it on purpose. The upper class were entitled to being alone as they change, the middle were just divided between genders. You'd not yet been in the lower class baths but you already knew it would just be one big changing room.

Edin looked at you then at the two doors before pulling you softly to the men's side. Apparently he had taken your lack of movement as confusion of the system. You squeeze his shoulders softly and together you walking to the men's changing room.

It was about what you expected, cabinets lined two of the walls each with a small inset of a key stone with a towel on a peg above them. Based on how many pegs were empty the bath was busy. The ones missing a towel must in use. You and Edin walked over to two available cabinets and insert your key stones. Opening it you saw the magic to clean clothes was present but not to warm them, and there was only one shelf so you were walking out in the same clothes you had worn coming in. Again you mind brought up the lower class baths. All you could picture was a pile in the middle of the room, throw your clothes in when you arrive and take whatever you want on the way out.

You laugh softly at the image. "S-Christopher?" Edin says then looks around the empty room nervously. It was the first bit of restraint Edin had show when it came to public displays of your relationship.

"Just trying to picture what the lower class baths are like." You pull off your shirt and fold it into the cabinet. "The upper class have individual changing rooms." You explain further as you kick off your shoes and pull down your pants. Your shoes you put in the cabinet, there is only just room for them, your pants are folded and put on top of your shirt.

"O-oh." Edin mumbles as he stares at you stripping. You look over at him as you hook your fingers in your underwear. He eyes are very focused.

"Not getting a bath?" You tease him with a grin as you pull down your underwear and turn to him. The movement makes your cock sway a little and Edin's eyes follow the slight movement. He doesn't respond so you say, "Edin?"

"Huh?" Edin looks away from your cock then blushes. "R-right." He quickly pulls his shirt off as you turn back the cabinet and fold your last item of clothing inside. You grab your towel from it's peg and wrap it around your waist. Edin was pulling at his pants with eyes constantly drifting over to you. You walk over to him, the movement making him stop his stripping.

You stand behind him and put your hands over his. "Need help?" You ask stepping forward to press your back against him.

"Huh?" Edin asked, his still on pants hinting that he had apparently forgetting why he was here.

"Your pants?" You push your hands down on his reminding him of his reason for being here. He pulls them down leaving your hands to grab his hips and leans down to pick them and his shoes up. As he bent you move a hand from his hip to the small of his back. He stays bent at the waist as you stroke his skin for a moment. Apparently he isn't the only one capable of forgetting why you were here.

You are only reminded of your collective purpose when you hear a door. You look over to see a man your age walking in from the baths with a towel around his waist. He either doesn't see the two of you or just doesn't acknowledge what was happening. Understandable given your and Edin's positions.

You pull your hand back and Edin stands up and puts his pants and shoes in the cabinet. You grab his towel and wrap it around his waist. You didn't make any comment about what you were doing but he seemed to understand your intent. He lifts one leg after the other to pull down his underwear under the cover of the towel and throws them in the cabinet. He takes his towel from your grasps and folds it around his waist to keep it there.

With the both of you now ready you walk through the door the man had come through and are greet by about what you were expecting of the middle class baths.

The pool was still present but there were not extravagant statues and there were only two platforms at both ends of the pool. The other side of the pool from you rather than have a platform had a bench set against the wall. As you stepped further into the room you couldn't see a mosaic on the bottom of the pool but there was one at the back of each platform. Both were rather simple depictions of what you were assuming was the cities skyline observed from outside it on the land. the hills were more pronounced than you recall them being, towering over the buildings that weren't on them. The buildings on top of the hills were was almost as tall as the hills themselves. The mosaic's weren't garish or ugly but the at the bottom of the upper class pool was clearly better quality.

There were people a plenty here. The platforms were packed the far bench had only a few spaces not occupied and the pool had people both swimming in the middle and lounging by it's edges. Most were chatting giving the room the dim of life.

Your and Edin's presence garnered no attention so you looked for somewhere the two of you could sit together. Someone got off a platform and their space was immediately taken up by someone getting off the bench. "Pool or bench?" You ask Edin.

"Bench." Edin said and together you walk around the pool's edge to take a seat. Your movements attracted some eyes but none lingered beyond a curious glance.

When you sat down you were a little surprised to find the bench was warm. With a glance it you saw some magic heating the stone. It was a nice touch and as you leaned back you saw something that had been obscure from your view when you entered. There were small cutaways behind the bench into the wall with water inside. Not large enough you to fit in or anything but you could scoop out water to wash yourself. There were probably wooden scoops somewhere for that purpose.

Edin leaned back to rest against the wall. He was short enough that his feet weren't touching the ground as he did. You joined his leaning and closed your eyes. For being stone it was decently comfortable and the steam slowly rising off the cutaway pools left a very faint sheen on your skin which made you feel like you were being cleaned. You assumed that like the upper class baths the water was infused to be cleaning without the need for soap.

After a few relaxing breathes you decided to address what you'd wanted to address. "What did you think of Lucia?" You say it softly and hope no one other than Edin would hear. Everyone near you were in their own conversations so you doubted they'd pay attention even if they heard.

"She's not a noble." Edin said, there as no intonation in his voice to suggest any hidden meaning and you opened your eyes enough to see his aura. No hidden emotions that you could see.

"So?" You ask hoping the reason for Edin's coldness towards her wasn't limited to social hierarchy.

"Our sponsor won't want us around non-nobles, it's why she put us the middle class." He said it with clear knowledge so he wasn't interpreting.

"She told you that?" It was worth checking to make sure. If Edin had been told that would limit you, no matter how much you might like spending time with Lucia it wasn't worth risking your sponsorship.

"Didn't have too." Edin responded.

It was a no so you might be able to interact with Lucia but Edin knew Anastasia far better than you so you should take him at his word. You'd have a think about how to break things with Lucia, for now at least, fourth ever friend or not Anastasia was already pissed at you no point pushing her. Which brought you to your next question. "What happened with her this morning?"

Edin shifted uncomfortably. "She just, she..." Edin trailed of as he tried to put his thoughts into words. "She'll tell you if she wants to."

You had been expecting something like that from Edin. No matter how he feels about you Anastasia had made his dream of coming to the Royal Academy a reality. Putting him between the two of you was nothing short of cruelty.

"She give you lunch?" You ask it knowing it would give him a chance to launch into an anecdote about how amazing something was.

"It was amazing." You smile as he said it and as he recounts Anastasia taking him to a restaurant and lavishing him with food and attention you relax against the stone. Hearing him talk so happily calmed you. Knowing he was happy making you happy as well.

When the story ended you told it sounded wonderful and hopefully you'll out together some time. That made him blush and keep quiet as you realised you'd accidentally told him you were going to ask him on a date and not that you had made a comment about Anastasia not abandoning you.

"She bought you some clothes as well." Edin said after his blush had worn off.

"What sort of clothes?" You ask worrying about what she would have bought for you without you being present, not that your presence would have impacted her buying of anything.

"She told me to leave that as a surprise. They'll arrive in a week." He was grinning way to happy as he said that and you worried anew at whatever that implied.

You lapsed back into silence as you did your best to not picture clothes Anastasia would make you wear. Maybe you could leverage wearing too ridiculous an outfit into letting you be friends with Lucia.

After a while of condensing steam dripping off you you decided to use the cutaway water to wash yourself. You could go into the pool but everyone in it was naked which meant you would be going in without Edin and you still wanted to be close to him.

You leaned down and dipped your hands into the water. It was very warm as you scooped a cupped handful out to wash your face. It felt lovely and you cupped another handful to wash your hair. You made sure to only let as little water onto your towel as you could.

You kept it up until you felt as much of your upper body was clean as it could be. When you finished Edin got up and sat down on the cutaway side of you. Rather than get handfuls of water her dipped a corner of his towel in the water and wiped the damp material over his body. He'd kept the towel covering his waist but slide the water dipped part under the rest of it to clean all of himself.

You felt a little dumb as he cleaned himself much more efficiently than you had but at least your towel was dry ... you ran a hand over it one a section that should be dry and felt a dampness. Right steam.

You lean back reminding yourself this was a learning experience, nothing to be embarrassed about.

Edin moved back to his position once he had wiped down his whole body. You then dipped the edge of your towel into the cut away and wiped down you legs. With only one part of you not washed you looked around the room. There were a few naked people who's towel were folded next to the but aside from those in the pool most had towels around their waists. As you look around it clicked that there were a lot of bare tits. That fact it had no impact on you must come down to the setting. Unlike when you were in the baths with Vatarie there was nothing even remotely sexual about the nakedness in this room.

Feeling a little comfortable you unwrapped your towel. You didn't take it off your waist to expose yourself as others had but it made cleaning your groin easier. You do so without much haste and when you finished you saw Edin watching you intently. His hands were in his lap and you leaned back. With how Edin felt about you seeing him in private being seeing in public having a reaction like that is way too much. With you not doing anything to attract his attention he was able to calm down pretty quickly.

After a while longer you looked around and noticed the room was much emptier than it had been. People had been leaving without you even noticing. You should have trained your perception. There had been plenty of people here and they had been still which would have been perfect for you. Oh well. You lean forward and look at Edin. Edin leans forward as well. Apparently he was ready to leave and was waiting for you.

You stand and only as you feel your towel touch your feet did you remember that you hadn't redone your towel around your waist after having undone it to clean. Very few people looked at you but you could feel the eyes of the people who did. You didn't care all that much. It wasn't down to your reincarnation, at least not totally, but while you made sure you were physically healthy you'd never cared all that much about your physical self. Not treating it as a meat suit or anything but just being kinda indifferent to it.

As you heard a few gasps and conversation cut off a little you had mixed feeling. You didn't care about the attention but the staring and conversation you inspired made you uncomfortable. Unlike Vatarie's friend when she tried to look up your towel this was very public.

You scoop up the towel and wrap it tightly around your waist as you and Edin make your way back to the changing room. As you leave you can feel the eyes staring at you and deliberately prevent yourself from hearing the inspire conversations.

Entering the changing room feeling a tingle all over your body as you pass through the doorway. Looking at the door you see the spell. It was a much more complex lock and key spell. The door was a lock and you were sure if you checked the magic the water had been imbued with you would see the key.

Again it was a wonderful display of a magic you cannot do. You consider walking back into the pool to see what happens if you take a handful of water through the doorway. As Edin walks to his cabinet you decide to stick with him. You go to your cabinet and insert your stone. It opens and you get dressed, the cold clothes were a change from your usual bath experience but it's a luxury you could go without if it came to it.

Edin finished changed just after you and together you leave. Walking past the upper class baths you once again await your abduction. When it doesn't happen you wonder where Vatarie was, so far she had been more consistent in her sudden appearances.

The two of you make it all the way to your room with no Vatarie at all. You hope she is ok.