Seventeen Stones (11 page)

She
saw him and froze.  Her reaction seemed to encourage him.  He smirked and said
in a loud voice to one of the gang of boys surrounding him “I can’t believe
what they’re letting in the college these days.  One wonders who they bribed.” 
He pulled off his kid gloves with the air of bored indifference that had worked
so well in the past.  He glanced back at Mia for a split second and then
whispered something else to one of his friends.  The entire group broke out
into laughter.  Ella was motionless with shock, but Mia could see that Vivian
was already extracting herself from her group with a hard expression on her
face.  Mia assumed a cold tone and sneered right back at Martin “Wondering if it
was the same person you used?”

He
lost his cool air immediately.  “You little village harpy!”  Mia took a single,
measured step forward.  There was no Emma here to care if she wasn’t polite,
and she was tired of dealing with him.  “You started it, Martin.  You want to
act like a pedigree and a fortune mean everything in the world?  Fine.  My
mother was a Greatlady.  Who are your parents?  Your father is glorified clerk
in the Magus’ office.  Your mother flits from one party to another.  Hardly
what I would call exalted positions.”  She looked him in the eye for half a
second before they both reached for their wands. 

A
light cough from directly behind Mia caught their attention before either wand
cleared a pocket.  What would have been said or done was lost.  Martin turned
puce and then turned around and walked away.  Mia glanced behind her, with her
wand still gripped in her left hand and saw Professor Fain.  “I was just
passing by from my office Miss Rusticov.  If you are finished for the night,
may I walk you to your dorm?” 

As
they walked back to the dorm the Professor asked “I suppose he’s not someone
you met recently?”  Mia shook her head.  “We grew up in the same village.  He
decided that since I didn’t have parents and didn’t live in a home, he could
act like a...well like he was acting tonight.  Today’s the first time we’ve
seen each other since we both arrived for college, at least outside of class. 
He never pulled this stuff where adults could see him.  He’s probably annoyed
that he got caught.” 

The
professor snorted.  “I imagine he’s annoyed that you verbally decapitated him
and handed him his head on a platter.  You have an uncomfortable knack for
seeing exactly what people don’t want you to see and then blurting it out.  I’m
not sure I would have had the courage to call the Magus’ private secretary a
glorified clerk in first year.  The Ainsley boy won’t forgive that.  You’ve
made yourself an enemy.” 

Mia
tapped her chin, pretending to consider.  “I wonder what it would be like if
Martin Ainsley didn’t like me…oh wait, no, he’s never liked me.  It’s not like
he can get anymore petty or vindictive than he’s already been.”  Professor Fain
didn’t answer immediately, but looked very thoughtful.  “Don’t make enemies unnecessarily. 
You don’t realize how much what you do here will affect the rest of your life. 
It’s a very small world for a wanded person.  Martin’s family is very powerful,
not necessarily just from their magical abilities.  They have a lot of
political influence.  It’s hard enough to get invited to all the ‘right’
parties without annoying the old blood families, and Martin’s related to
everyone.  Try to stay with the other girls as much as you can.  You’ll be
safer if you do.”  It seemed important to him.  She looked up and nodded.   

He
grinned a little at her nod.  “Well, I suppose I should tell you that you’ll
have to put up with me in Charms until Headmistress Villanova finds someone
else.  I have a free period and she threatened to turn me into a frog and make
it look like an accident if I didn’t.”  She laughed with him.  His good humor
was apparently restored by her promise.  He waved her into the dorm and walked
off, whistling softly into the night.  Mia climbed the stair to her room. 

Ella
and Vivian came in right behind her.  “You didn’t tell us your mother was a Greatlady!” 
The words tumbled out of Vivian’s mouth.  She’d probably been suppressing this
outburst since Mia had slipped up in the tea room.  Mia looked down at the
bedspread and traced the embroidery with a fingertip.  “She died when I was
born.  I don’t really know that much about her.  And I didn’t want to talk
about it.”  Vivian had the grace to look slightly embarrassed; Mia was sure she
was just annoyed that she had missed such a juicy tidbit about someone she’s
spent two whole days with.  Ella grinned.  “You put that little snot in his
place though!  Him coming in acting like he’s the Magus himself…” 

Vivian
agreed quickly, perhaps to make up for her earlier resentment.  “Cute, but I
wouldn’t touch that one with a ten foot pole; he’s always going to think that
he’s better than everyone around him.”  She grinned a little at Mia and flawlessly
mimicked the ultra-refined accent of the wanded elite.  “How did you ever manage
to meet someone so unpleasant?” 

By the
next morning all of the girls knew about Mia’s mother and about the argument
with Martin the night before.  Mia was a little worried that Sarah might be annoyed
with her.  She’d grown up with Martin after all.  Sarah’s first reaction to the
news laid that worry to rest.  “Serves him right, self-important little…” 

Apparently
Sarah liked Martin even less than Mia did; she
had
grown up around him. 
“Of course, he never treated me like he treated you.  I let him know very quickly
that my grandfather was a Greatlord, and that he’d better not get in a pedigree
competition with me.  I always did it in private; I bet he nearly wet his pants
when you said that in front of the entire tea room at
the college
!” 
Sarah threw back her blond head and cackled. 

Mia’s
first class the next day was called “Sight” and she was in it with Lizzy and
Beth.  Sight wasn’t technically a magical skill.  Sight was regulated and
overseen by the Oracle, and the Seer in charge of the class was the only
non-wanded professor they had in the curriculum.  They entered the room and
went to their desks as the Professor nodded to each of them in turn.  She looked
very much out of place in brilliant white robes with fuchsia flowers wound into
butterscotch-colored hair. 

“Welcome. 
I am Seer Glen from the oracle of Gambor Pass.  I will be your Sight Professor.” 
She looked at the faces in her room.  “I think most of you have noted that you
are all female.  Sight is the only known area of talent with a true sex bias,
no matter what some of the professors here might think.”  She smiled grimly and
Mia wondered if she’d encountered Marshall. 

“Most
of the sighted ones are trained at the Oracle.  Your wanded status will keep
you from achieving full seer status.  It’s part of a long standing tradition.  However,
the College and the Oracle agree that even though you won’t be officially
serving in the capacity of seers, your gifts do need to be trained.  Untrained
sight tends to make the less gifted members of our society uncomfortable. 
Sighted children often reveal other people’s secrets without meaning to.”

The
seer lifted a box of small silk bags onto her desk.  Each was a frantic shade
of purple.  She passed the bags out by hand instead of levitating them like
most people would have.  “Now, I have another test for you.  Most of you have
probably been using the sight without meaning to.  Raise your hands if you have
dreams that sometimes come true, or if you’ve moved a moment before a branch
fell or a carriage sped by.”  A good half of the class raised their hands, but
Mia wasn’t one of them.  She’d actually moved out of the way from several branches
in the forest, but that had nothing to do with any mystical sight, and
everything to do with keen hearing.  The seer nodded.  “What we’re about to do
should help you focus your talent.  I want each of you to empty the bag in
front of you and write down the number attached to the cord.  There are four
objects in each bag.  I want you to touch each of them and write down your
impressions, and then bring the bags and paper to me.” 

Mia
took out a piece of parchment and wrote her name and the bag’s number, 10, at
the top.  Her bag contained a small spool of thread, a pewter charm, a lock of
blond hair tied with a pink satin ribbon, and a wooden box, no larger than her
thumbnail squared.  

She
chose to handle the spool of thread first, thinking something so mundane might
be easier to read.  She didn’t get a single image, just a slight smell of
sausage.  She sighed as she wrote down her impression; somehow she didn’t think
that sausage was what Professor Glen was looking for. She had better luck with
the charm: the current fashion was to dangle charms like it on a long
necklace.  Mia had a feeling that this one was meant to hang on a bracelet. 
She didn’t get anything at all off the wooden box or the lock of hair.  When
Mia handed her parchment over and walked away, she caught the professor
sniffing the spool of thread out of the corner of her eye. 

Lizzy
and Beth were the star students in Sight.  As twins, they had what was known as
an echo effect.  What one twin saw the other could see from a slightly
different perspective, adding detail and depth.  This wasn’t unheard of
according to Seer Glen, but it was the first time the seer had been given the
opportunity to witness the process; she spent the better part of the class
piggy-backing their visions.  

Vivian
and Ella were waiting for them in History.  Martin Ainsley walked in right
behind the girls.  He shot her a hate-filled glance and then sat as far away
from her as he could get and still be in the same room.  She returned the look
with interest and continued talking with her friends until the chimes sounded. 
Mia didn’t think about him once she was seated; all of her attention was for
the professor.  She was sitting at the desk reading a little book in one hand
and taking notes with the other.  A few seconds after the chimes sounded she
closed her book and the rumpled little woman stood up behind her desk. 

“Welcome
class.  I am Professor Tate.” She had a pleasant, musical voice.  “Take out
your wands please.” She smiled as she pushed strands of mouse brown hair away
from the enormous spectacles.  The specs were decidedly odd.  The base appeared
to be a normal set of glasses, larger than Mia’s fist.  Attached to the sides
on hinges were smaller lenses, ranging in size from a fig to a cherry, each in
different colors: azure, yellow, ruby, and green.  At the moment, the colored
glass hung unused to the side of the professor’s face, giving her the appearance
of an odd butterfly.  Her fine hair was tangled in the hinge, and she occupied
herself with detangling the hair while the class quietly pulled out their
wands.  She pulled off the glasses, pointed her wand, and muttered something
under her breath; a second, smaller pair of spectacles zoomed through the open
window.  She carefully placed the first pair in a black case and carelessly dropped
the second pair on her nose. 

She
grinned at the class again.  “I expect I looked a bit odd with those on!”  A
few of Mia’s classmates tittered.  “Right then, on to the job I was actually
hired to do, History!  This will be unlike any history class you might have
taken before.  In this class we don’t concern ourselves with boring dates and
random facts.  We learn about the
stories
behind it.  History is all
about people.  The classic question in History is this: if a man saves the
world and no one knows, will anyone care?”  She had walked around her desk, as
if wishing to be closer to them, and absently hopped up on the top.  “I teach you
to look for the reasons that history happened.  When we’re lucky, we have firsthand
accounts of the events from the people in charge, but you and I know that a
single point of view won’t give you the whole story.  We take the firsthand
account, and then we research the existing records to see if they match.  They
almost never do. But even then, knowing that a keep under siege used seventeen
bales of hay every week, it shows us two things.  Who can figure out what I’m
talking about?” 

A
tall black-haired boy raised his hand.  “You can guess how many horses that the
keep was feeding.”  The professor nodded encouragingly.  “And I suppose if they
were using seventeen bales of hay a week, then they must have either had
enormous stores, or they had some way to get supplies in and out.”  The
professor nodded.  “Exactly.  Those seemingly random facts and household
accounts can add validity to the firsthand account, or give us the clues to
find out what happened when no one had a pen handy.  Of course anything like a siege
is pre-City rule anyway, but it’s nice to have some idea of what happened in
the past.”

She
hopped off her desk and started pacing.  “We will cover the most important
spells for the historian:  the truth spell, which detects certain falsehoods spoken
or written, Dennis Dougherty’s Dating Spell that can estimate the date an
object was made, protection spells used for items of value, and ways to decode
the secrets that our forefathers left hidden in the libraries in the City
bounds.”  She cast a beatific smile at all of them.  “Now who knows the basic
enchantment for truth spells?”