Fearsome Dreamer (9 page)

‘Ignore them,' said a voice.

White looked up.

The boy smiled.

‘They're not used to foreigners, that's all,' he said, sitting across from White with his breakfast plate balanced carefully on his hand.

‘They do not bother me,' said White. He turned slightly away from the tableful of students goggling at him.

‘They don't?' the boy asked, amused. ‘They would me. My name's Wren, by the way.'

Wren. The Talented student that so impressed Frith.

White watched him crack open an egg and dig his spoon enthusiastically into the shell. Wren had a nice enough face, sandy hair, and a soft round body that spoke of good living and no hard work, but he was quite ordinary-looking. Except for his eyes. His eyes were different. Expressive. Shifting through amused, fierce, then excited, all in a moment.

And his Talent was obvious. He carried it like a cloak around his shoulders. It hung proudly from his frame. He was definitely not shy.

But then, none of these students were.

White unenthusiastically stirred his oatmeal. Frith hadn't really prepared him for the staring part of it all.

After saying yes to Frith's offer, and making his choice, such as it was, in that tiny interrogation room, White had stared at his plate until someone had entered the room and quietly cleared it away, and then brought in dessert; pears baked in sugar, so soft each spoonful melted on his tongue.

As they ate, Frith had told White all about the university where he would be studying. It sprawled across a goodly section of Parisette's fashionable East Quartier. White remembered seeing it from the outside – a haphazard, village-like place surrounded by a smooth wall too high to climb. Frith gave him a map of the campus, a huge piece of stiff cloth paper that folded into pocket size with careful creases, buildings labelled with tiny, curling script and colour coded according to area of study.

He described the lessons White would have. He talked about the respect that White should show his tutors. He told White to be a silent, empty glass, to learn and to absorb and only speak when spoken to.

He would be reported on, said Frith, just like every other student in the group of Talented he would study with. They would monitor his progress, so he should try his hardest to impress, but not to show off. Frith said that he could take White straight to his new home on campus, if he liked. White could stay there tonight, and start his lessons in the morning.

He knew he was supposed to find it too fast, too overwhelming, all at once. Lessons in the morning when he hadn't even slept in a bed for weeks. He was supposed to ask for more time. He was supposed to widen his eyes and stammer that it was too soon. He was supposed to look puzzled and wonder why they weren't going to put a guard on him at all times, afraid that he might try and run back to World at any moment.

But these were pointless thoughts. A guard certainly wouldn't be able to stop him going anywhere he liked. They knew that he would never go back to World, not now. And how prepared would a few more days of nothing make him?

Better to start tomorrow. Better not to give himself time to think. So White nodded and looked serious and said that was fine. He thought he caught a ghost of admiration in Frith's eyes, and felt the comforting warmth of approval.

Frith got a maid to draw White a bath, a completely new experience for him. It sat, a giant tub in the middle of a bare, tiled room. White was alone, but felt like the room watched him somehow as he slid uneasily in. He scrubbed and scrubbed at his skin, marvelling at how black the water turned as weeks of dirt bloomed within it. But the water was heavily perfumed, the smell clinging to his skin even after he was dry and dressed in new clothes. By now it felt impossible to keep awake, but Frith was waiting for him outside the room. He was handed a heavy mantle coat and told that they were leaving.

The journey was dark, too dark to see much outside their coach window. Ghosts of buildings drifted past as they rattled through the streets, unformed in the sparse street lighting they had here, all tall irregular lamp posts that threw everything into shadow more than they did relief. He only realised that they had arrived at their journey's end when the coach stopped and Frith said, ‘Here we are.'

They stepped out of the coach.

‘Some of the students might still be awake, even though they shouldn't be,' said Frith, opening the door of the building in front of them and ushering White inside. ‘So let's go and say hello. Nervous?'

‘No,' said White. His heart squeezed.

In truth, he hadn't been at all sure what to expect. How old were the other students, here? Maybe they were more advanced than him. Knowing and mature, giving him an imperious glance before dismissing him as a child.

Or maybe they would be embarrassingly younger than him, all noise and rabble, and he sticking out above their heads like an idiot.

They were quite a mix, as it turned out.

There were several of them still awake and lolling by a huge hearth in what looked to White like the social room of the house. Their faces turned towards him as he heard Frith say, ‘Good evening. I've brought you a present.'

Some looked as young as twelve. Others close to adulthood. They were silent.

‘He's a new student, and his name is White.' Frith paused. ‘Just White.'

He could actually feel the entire room's humming interest go up a notch.

‘As you may be able to tell, he's not Angle Tarain, but I'm sure you'll treat him the same way as you do each other. He'll start tomorrow with you.' Frith smiled at them all. ‘Be nice.'

One or two of them grinned, brazen. The rest didn't take their eyes off him.

Please, don't leave me here
.

‘We should get you a room,' he heard Frith say, and thanked him silently. ‘Let's go.'

White tried not to look grateful that he was fleeing. He felt stares tickling at his back.

It had been that way since; the staring and the whispering. The other students all seemed to find White utterly fascin-ating. None of them would talk to him; they looked away if he challenged their gazes. He hadn't yet said a word in class. He didn't want to seem frightened, but neither did he consciously want to give them another reason to stare once they heard his accent and strange way of speaking.

He hadn't seen Frith again, though the evening after his arrival he'd walked into his bedroom to discover a package of clothes in his size. Cream shirts with oversized cuffs, waistcoats with matching indoor jackets that reached his knees, and a pair of softened leather boots.

There was also a stiff purse containing coins sitting on the bed, together with a brief note from Frith explaining that he should go into the town and buy whatever he wanted, and that he would get a small amount of money at regular intervals.

But White hadn't yet dared to venture beyond campus. He would, he promised himself. It wasn't cowardice. He'd slept on those streets, hadn't he? It was just absurd to be afraid of going back to them, now he was safe and warm and fed.

In World, he at least had been able to go home after a day of school and escape from his peers' babble, and mock fights, and laughter. Here, when they finished training for the day, he went back to Red House with them all; back to the squat, dusky building where the Talented students lived together on campus. He ate with them. Studied with them. Endured their whisperings. Locked himself in his small bedroom when it became too much.

Which, frankly, had so far been most of the time.

‘There are all sorts of interesting rumours flying around about you,' said Wren, through mouthfuls of egg.

White tried to clamp down on a sudden flare of nervousness.

‘Such as?' he said, pushing his food around on his plate.

‘Oh, that you've had to run away from your country because your government wanted to kill you. That you fought off a dozen guards when they tried to arrest you, blasted them with your mind. That kind of crap.'

Well, actually, White wanted to say. That's not too far from the truth, in fact.

‘That is stupid,' he said instead, with an effort.

‘Yeah, I know. But I've heard that you're very Talented. Maybe even the most Talented they've found. Do you think that's true?'

White stared at the tabletop, irritated. What kind of a question was that?

‘I do not know.'

‘Oh stop it, Wren,' said someone else. White looked up. A girl had sauntered up to their table and was in the middle of sliding into place next to Wren, who put his hand out and gently lifted her long hair back over her shoulder, so that it wouldn't spill in her food.

She glanced shyly at White, her eyes barely touching his before blinking away.

‘I'm Areline,' she said. ‘I'm sure you don't remember all our names yet.'

White hadn't remembered her name, but it was extremely hard to forget a girl as lovely-looking as her. No wonder everyone perpetually tossed envious glances Wren's way.

‘How are you finding it so far?' she said.

White shrugged.

‘Well … weird, of course. It was weird for us when we first got here, too. Being trained in something we don't even know how to describe. I don't even know what the Talent
is
, really.'

‘But I think you do, right?' said Wren, watching White. ‘I think you know a lot about it.'

He can see it on me, too, White realised. He can see it like I can.

White felt his curiosity grow.

‘Perhaps,' he said.

‘We've got a free hour after breakfast, before our first lesson,' said Wren. ‘Why don't you show us what you can do?'

‘Wren, leave him alone.'

‘What?' he protested. ‘For fun, that's all! He'll have to show everyone in our next Talent class, anyway. Mussyer Tigh said so yesterday.'

White took a gulp of his coffee. He knew this game. Normally he would ignore someone like that until they took the hint and left him alone, but this was Wren. Frith's favourite.

‘Why not?' he said, standing up.

They stood in Red House's communal study.

Areline had draped herself over a couch, and pretended to be reading. White thought he could feel her eyes on the back of him.

‘So,' said Wren. ‘Can you Jump?'

Areline tutted.

‘Of course,' said White, starting to enjoy the game. The circling. ‘You cannot?'

Wren laughed. ‘Well, not everyone can. Not yet.'

‘No one can,' said Areline. ‘Apart from Wren.'

Is that a challenge?

White folded his arms.

‘Let's start with something easy,' said Wren. ‘You can hook, right?'

‘Hook?'

‘You might call it something different, where you're from. It's when you send your mind out into the black, to find a place to go. But you anchor part of yourself here, so you don't get lost.'

White understood immediately. He had never heard someone else talk about it before; it gave him a surprising shiver of pleasure. Someone who knew what it was like to have Talent like that. Someone who would understand him, and know him.

Wren took his hand. White pulled it away in surprise.

‘Don't be silly,' said Wren with a laugh. ‘I need to touch you, that's all. So we can do it together.'

‘Do … what?'

‘Hook,' said Wren, glancing at Areline with a roll of his eyes. She had given up pretending to read and was watching them both avidly.

‘I have never … done that with anyone else before.'

‘No?' said Wren. ‘Can't pretend I'm not relieved. I'll lead. Close your eyes.'

White hesitated. People closed their eyes when they did this? Maybe he had been doing it wrong. Maybe he was about to find out, right now, that he didn't know a thing about the Talent after all. That Frith had been mistaken about him.

Wren had his eyes closed.

White did the same.

After a moment, he felt something brushing insistently against him. Not his body. His mind. It was a strange sensation. A warm feather stroking gently on his brain.

It was Wren.

They were in the blackness. The nothing that existed between places. The dark that you had to cross whenever you Jumped. White had only ever been there for microseconds. He had never paused in it, too afraid to linger. Afraid that somehow, if he stayed there, he would get lost and confused, and never find his way back.

Yet here he was, standing in it with Wren.

It was like a dream. He could feel Wren next to him, but wouldn't afterwards be able to say if he'd actually seen him or heard him when he spoke.

Wren tugged at him, trying to get him to follow; but he suddenly had a better idea. He clutched tight to Wren and pulled him
his
way. Wren resisted for a moment; then let himself be moved.

The blackness was sucked backwards, stripped roughly away by light and air and the smell of living things.

They moved through it and stepped out into the real.

‘Er … this isn't where I wanted us to go,' said Wren, looking around with puzzled eyes.

‘It is my bedroom.'

‘Which bedroom?'

‘In Red House. Mine. Upstairs.'

Wren turned and stared at him, until he started to feel uncomfortable.

‘You're trying to tell me you Jumped us a
few feet
?'

White shifted, embarrassed.

‘Yes,' he said. ‘Is that … unusual?'

‘Gods, it's impossible! At least, I thought it was.'

White folded his arms defensively. Now he felt like an idiot for trying to prove himself. He had gone too far. The expression on Wren's face was too close to the ones he remembered from childhood.

‘Do it again,' said Wren suddenly.

‘What?'

‘Come on. Jump us back to the study. I want to see it properly this time.'

Wren held his hand out.