He could tell her shock only in the silence that followed, Aayina Ram too disciplined to look aghast in public. He'd not only spoken to her in the familiar sense, he'd abandoned any sense of propriety at all. Only his siblings generally got to hear Alaric's unfiltered thoughts like that, and even then, he'd been trying to be their guardian more than brother lately. 
A job he'd spectacularly failed at.
"You should be careful about the company you keep, Lady Ram," the unwanted snideness of Biagio Lazzarini warned, "some families are full of vile serpents that are just waiting to strike." 
"It might reflect poorly on your sisters if you were found to keep such vile company," Damaso Lazzarini added on. 
"It's rather kind of you to introduce yourselves then, Lords Lazzarini," Alaric used formality as sarcasm this time. "Though considering your brother Fabrizio's distasteful habit of scaling into little girls' bedrooms, maybe it'd be more apt to describe yourselves as boogeymen instead of serpents. 
Both Biagio and Damaso were older than Alaric, but he could tell by their visible bristling that they lacked the maturity to keep the fight verbal only. It was considered ungentlemanly to fight in public instead of using the Bouts and proper process but given the actions of their little brother Alaric had low expectation for their etiquette. They'd already proven themselves uncouth enough to try and provoke a confrontation, it was public knowledge that Alaric had written a formal Letter of Accusation already, so they should be keeping their distances as the Information Bureau conducted its investigation. 
If they were intelligent men, they wouldn't have made such a stupendous mistake, but these were clearly not intelligent men despite a noble education. 
As Biagio took a threatening step forwards, despite the Social Event sounding around them, when Aayina Ram surprised them all, "take another step forwards and I'll unleash a curse of such irritating prowess you'll long for death." Alaric didn't doubt her statement at all, even if he'd never witnessed her magic. "You will not make a scene anywhere near where I am, if you do, I will not need to use violence or even a Letter against you to ruin your life. I will simply curse you with my magic; imagine every forkful of food, mouth of wine, and even the comfort of your bed infested with swarms of angry, biting fire ants. They will so where you go, they will crawl and bite and pester from the moment I command them to until long after you beg me for mercy. Now take this foolishness you're planning and go," she slashed her finger out, as pointed a direction to follow as any command. 
Alaric wasn't entirely certain if he was included in that or no, so while Biagio and Damaso Lazzarini turned on their heels to leave, he remained in place. And then opened his mouth as she turned to look at him, "I do believe I owe you a drink for that Aayina," and he was back to being unintentionally familiar. 
She gave him a look he could naively call amusement, but was far more likely to be exasperation, "I said take your foolishness and go."
"My foolish self is going Aayina, but you're coming with me to get a drink. And then we can appropriately plot how to get the rest of your siblings Courted; just don't look at Calvin for that, he's..." Alaric hesitated.
"In love with his best friend and hasn't realized it yet?  I noticed," she sounded amused. "To tell you the truth, I almost envy them."
"Neither Calvin nor Danilo are aware of how the other one feels, how is that something to envy?" Alaric didn't understand.
"They long for each other; have you ever yearned for someone, just to be in the same room with them while they do mundane tasks without even needing to talk to you?" her perspective of it surprised him.