What does it mean? (open-Astronomy Tower)

[Jory Addison]

Jory's eyes widened at that news. "He is?" He hadn't known Markise had a sister, or any siblings, for that matter. Whatever else she had asked was forgotten for that. "Bet you've heard bad stuff about me, then." Markise was one of the ones where it was impossible to do the right thing. But Brindle hadn't said anything bad about him, or had any weird reaction when she found out who he was.

[Brindle Sterling]

"What? No," Brindle said. He was so sweet, it was worth a little white lie, and she usually dismissed what her brother said when he was in a pissy mood anyway. "He's usually talking about his shop or his boyfriend." That much was true, but she'd also heard unflattering things about Jory. She still heard about Michael once in a while, and about what an idiot Dare was, but they were cute idiots, and they meant well.

[Jory Addison]

"Ariel's nice, a little...like...quiet and all intense and stuff sometimes," Jory said, choosing to believe her about what Markise talked about. Maybe he wasn't important enough to be complained about to Brindle. "And his shop's really cool." He did like the shop, and he couldn't help thinking that Ariel was hot, but he wasn't going to seek out Markise again.

[Brindle Sterling]

"I wouldn't say quiet," Brindle corrected. She eyed her telescope a moment longer before straightening to look out over the grounds. "More like brooding. But I think the badass thing is an act. He came for dinner a few times and he and Markise were acting like kids. I don't think Mama or Papa noticed, but they had some kind of joke going on." And she didn't even want to know what it was.

[Jory Addison]

"I don't know, he's pretty intimidating when he's got his wand out," Jory said, though his mind immediately took his own words to the wrong place. Wow, he really needed to do something about that. It was becoming a problem. "He doesn't seem like someone that jokes a lot." But he hadn't been around Ariel enough to really know.

[Brindle Sterling]

Any innuendo, intentional or otherwise, went straight over Brindle's head. She shrugged. "I haven't really talked to him. Markise keeps him away from me or something." Like anything else potentially interesting. He didn't pay nearly enough attention to her to actually protect her, if that was what he thought he was doing.

[Jory Addison]

"Well that's stupid," Jory said, turning to look through the telescope and sketch out what had changed since the last time. "I mean, if he's dating your brother then you should be able to get to know him. I mean, they're, like, living together, aren't they?" And they were out, it was pretty obvious they were serious, it didn't make sense not to let Brindle talk to Ariel.