Semi-finalist #17

Name:  Susan Francino

Caspric looked down at the servant blocking the door.  “Why exactly can’t I come in?”
    
“I have orders from Sir Drake that you’re not to be allowed.”

“Oh really?” said Caspric, raising a dark eyebrow. “Well, although you take orders from Sir Drake–” He reached around the servant and put his hand on the door knob. “I don’t.”
    
Caspric stepped inside the library and inhaled the familiar smell of old paper. Shafts of sunlight beamed through the dusty air. 
    
Drake sat at a table perusing a thick volume.
   
It was clear that they were brothers—both tall and dark-haired, with handsome, sharp features that made girls swoon—but the difference in clothing was almost enough to disguise this.  Drake wore a red silk vest over spotless white sleeves and had a ruby-studded ornamental dagger in his belt.  Caspric wore a plain white shirt, open at the collar and barely tucked into his pants, which, like his boots, were dappled with mud.  He was still sweaty from a morning of sparring practice. 
    
“What possessed you to open a history book?” Caspric said, peering over his brother’s shoulder. “And why do you have someone guarding the door?”
     
“Go away,” said Drake. He flipped the page, sending up a poof of dust.
    
Caspric frowned.  “You never read.”
   
Drake traced his ring-laden fingers down a column of text.  He closed the book and grinned up at Caspric.  “I do today.”