Wielder's Awakening (32 page)

He sprang towards the three advancing friends of Rudy without warning.  He landed with a kick to the chest of the closest one.  As the fellow fell backwards stunned, another one swung at Traven.  Traven ducked and dropped to the ground.  He immediately spun his leg around in an arc tripping both of the other students.  He then jumped away from the three on the floor towards Rudy.  Rudy took a furious swing at Traven.  Traven was too fast, however, and ducked under the swing.  He countered with a quick jab at Rudy’s jaw.  Rudy tried to duck but ended up being hit square in the eye.  Traven smiled as Rudy stumbled backward with his hand over his eye, screaming like he was going to die.  Traven’s smile was replaced by a startled yelp as he was suddenly hit from behind.  He barely had time to get his hands out to brace himself before he crashed down against the wooden floor with someone on his back.  He swung his elbow backwards, knocking the assailant off.  Traven grunted as the other two were immediately on top of him, pinning him to the ground before he had time to stand.

“What is going on here!” a booming voice yelled from the front of the hall.

The two fellows on Traven’s back immediately scrambled off.  Traven pushed himself up from the floor to stand beside the other young men as Headmaster Brock stomped down the hall towards them.

“Right after I give a speech about acting civilized, I hear what sounds like animals banging around up here and find you young men rolling around like swine!  Now someone tell me what is going on!” Headmaster Brock demanded as he stared sternly at all of them.

Traven opened his mouth to answer but was cut off by Rudy before he could say anything.

“I am very sorry about this, Headmaster Brock,” Rudy began while dabbing at his puffy eye tenderly.  “We came up here to get some money before heading out, but when we started back down the hall this guy in black attacked us and tried to take our money.  We could not just let him so-”

“That’s not what happened,” Traven cut in.  “These fellows just walked up and started-”

“Enough!”  Headmaster Brock exclaimed, cutting both of them off.  “I do not care what happened!  You boys can head up to my office where I will tell you what is going to happen.”  All of the young men, including Thad, started up the hall towards the stairs.  “Thadius, where do you think you are going?  I can see that you had nothing to do with this.  You may head back to your room.”

Thad gave Traven a sympathetic look and headed towards his room.  Traven followed the four fellows in front of him with Headmaster Brock at his heels.  Traven smiled as he watched all four of them rubbing sore parts of their bodies.  He on the other hand was feeling perfectly fine.  His moment of happiness was cut short as he thought about what might happen when he got to the headmaster’s office.  He hadn’t even been there a day, and he was already in trouble.  Hopefully Headmaster Brock would listen to what he had to say and wouldn’t punish him.  Traven continued to follow in silence as they took the stairs up to the third floor and walked up the hall until they arrived at a door with the word Headmaster engraved on it.  Headmaster Brock opened the door and motioned for all of them to go in.  After they were all inside the small room, he shut the door behind him and walked over to his desk.  All four of the young men shot angry gazes at Traven while the headmaster’s back was turned.  When Headmaster Brock reached his desk, he sat down in the chair and stared at them with a very stern expression.  All five students stood in front of the desk in silence.  Finally, Headmaster Brock opened his mouth and spoke.

“I am very disappointed in you boys,” he began in a stern tone.  “This is an academy of learning, not an alley.  When you are within these walls, I expect you to act like gentlemen.  If you must act like animals, do it somewhere else!”  He then looked directly at Rudy.  “Rudyard, I know that your father would not be pleased if he heard of this incident.  If you and your friends promise that this will never happen again, I will not inform him of it.  Nonetheless, you four will spend your free day tomorrow in your rooms thinking of how this kind of a thing can be avoided.  Is that understood?”

“Yes, Headmaster Brock,” they muttered in unison.

“Good!  You may now head down to your rooms.  You four have already had enough excitement for one night.”

All four of them grumbled quietly under their breath as they walked past Traven and out of the office.  Traven then found himself standing before the headmaster’s desk alone.  Headmaster Brock shook his head before going on.

“Your name is Traven.  Am I correct?”

“Yes, sir,” Traven replied.

“You just got here today.  You should be glad you made it today instead of tomorrow.  If you had not made it today, you would not be attending here.  As it is, you made it barely in time so you are a student.  Our problem now is that not only are you a peasant and showed up late, you also got into a fight immediately upon arriving.”

“I am sorry, sir, but I can explain about-”

“There is nothing for you to explain,” the headmaster said, cutting Traven off.  “I really could care less as to why you were late or how you came to be involved in that brawl.  What I do care about is that you understand that we do not like trouble makers here.  I allowed you to be enrolled here because this year we have a small group of students.  Usually I would have refused your kind.  I run a very respectable school.  Many of the wealthiest merchants and nobles send their sons to this academy.  That young man that you apparently punched in the eye is of noble blood and is the son of one of the wealthiest traders in all of Kalia.  You on the other hand are no one.

“I do not know how your family got the money to send you here, but they did.  Now I do not like to kick anyone out of the academy once they have paid, but if you are involved in any other problems I will be forced to.  Out of all the students there were no fights all week until you arrived.  I do not want you blemishing my academy.  If you are involved in any other problems or even think of causing problems, I will not hesitate to throw you out.  So, Traven, do you understand what I am saying?”

“Yes, sir,” Traven answered quietly with downcast eyes.

“Then make sure you are on your best behavior, and we should not have any more problems.  You will also spend your free day tomorrow in your room and be thankful that that is all.  I will hopefully not be seeing you in my office again, young man.  Now head down to bed.”

“Yes, Headmaster Brock.”

Traven walked out of the room and headed for the stairs.  He could not believe the way the headmaster had talked to him!  He hadn’t thought he would be treated any worse by the headmaster than anyone else.  Mr. Kiscin had warned him about the prejudices, but he hadn’t fully believed him until now.  He was mostly upset at the fact that the headmaster hadn’t cared about what had really happened.  He didn’t care who started fights, he just cared that there weren’t any more.  Traven knew that he’d better be extra careful if he wanted to stay at the school.  He decided to do his best and steer clear of the four troublemakers.  He would show Headmaster Brock that he was as well behaved and just as intelligent as any of the richer students.  As soon as he got to his room, he got ready for bed and went to sleep.  He hoped that today’s events weren’t an indicator of how the term was going to be.

Traven woke early the next morning.  He was used to getting up to do his exercises and wondered if it would violate the headmaster’s commands if he left his room to exercise.  He seriously thought about risking it but decided that it was not worth it.  He did not want to take the chance of getting kicked out of the academy.  Instead of going outside to practice, he just practiced stationary sword patterns in his room.  When he was done, he washed up with the water in the wash basin and got dressed in his black clothes once again.  He had planned on washing his riding clothes, but he wouldn’t be able to if he was stuck in his room all day.  He sat down on his bed and waited for the breakfast bell to ring.  Traven waited for what seemed like forever, listening to his stomach growl.  At last the breakfast bell finally rang.

He waited a while before leaving his room, being careful to avoid anyone that might be a problem.  When he came out, the hall was empty except for Thad who appeared to be waiting for him.  Traven shut his door and walked over to Thad.  They then headed towards the dining hall.  They arrived there at the end of the line as they had the previous evening.  After getting bowls full of a steaming porridge, they slapped butter on the top and some sugar before sitting down at the end of the table.  They ate mostly in silence with only a few comments about the food.  When they were done, they headed back up to Traven’s room.

“So what happened up in Headmaster Brock’s office,” Thad asked as soon as the door was shut.  “I have heard that Rudy and his friends are quite upset.”

“Brock just revoked our free day.  We have to stay in our rooms for the whole day.  I guess that really isn’t all that bad.  I also got warned that if it happened again, I’d be kicked out of the school.”

“What about the rest of them?”

“They were just asked not to do it again.  Oh well, I guess it doesn’t really matter anyway.”  Traven shrugged and sat down on his bed.

“I am sorry about everything,” Thad said after a minute.  “I never got a chance to thank you.  Rudy has been bothering me and some of the other students since the beginning of school, but none of us was brave enough to stand up to him.  Thank you.”  Thad patted Traven’s shoulder before turning to leave.  As he was going out the door he turned back around.  “I have a book you could borrow if you want so that you are not just sitting here doing nothing.”

“That would be nice,” Traven answered with a smile.

Thad came back a few minutes later with the book.  He left it with Traven and headed out to go and buy some things he needed.  Traven read the book for a little while but eventually had to put it down.  It was a book on philosophy.  It seemed like it might be interesting if you understood what you were reading, but most of the ideas mentioned left him confused.  He decided to just lie down on his bed and rest.  He spent the remainder of the day sleeping, trying to read Thad’s book, and practicing some of his exercises.  The day dragged out forever, but at last it came to an end.  When Traven went to sleep for the night, he was anxious for the morning to come and to finally be able to get his schooling underway.

He woke up early as usual and went down to the backyard of the school.  It was empty since it was so early in the morning, and there was plenty of room for Traven to do his exercises.  When he was done, he headed back up to his room.  He passed a few teachers in the halls as they were heading down for breakfast.  They all gave him strange looks as he passed.  He figured they were not used to seeing any of the students get up to exercise early in the morning.  He knew that he would never have done it before he met Blaize.  Ever since he had started, however, if he missed practicing in the morning for more than a day or two he began to feel sluggish and lazy.  By the time he had cooled off, the breakfast bell rang.  He waited outside Thad’s door for him, and then they went down to the mess hall.

When they were done eating, Traven didn’t know what to expect.  He still didn’t know what his schedule was or what classes he would be taking.  Thad told him that all of the students in their hall followed the same schedule and to just follow him.  Traven got up and followed Thad back to his room.  After Thad retrieved some books and papers, Traven followed him up to the third floor and into a classroom.  The class was filled with large, wooden desks all facing the front of the room where there was a blackboard.  The room was devoid of people except for the instructor.  Traven was happy to find that the instructor was actually Mr. Kiscin.  Mr. Kiscin greeted Thad and Traven.  He then got the books and paper out that Traven would need.  After receiving his supplies, he pulled out a chair and sat down next to Thad in one of the front desks.  Pulling out the drawer under the desk, he found several extra quill pens for the bottle of ink that was already in the upper right hand corner of his desk and some extra paper.  After pulling out one of the quill pens, he leaned back in his chair and waited for class to start.

Soon other students began to slowly file into the room in small clumps of threes and fours.  When the bell rang for the second time that morning, almost all of the desks were occupied by sleepy eyed students.  Traven, however, was wide awake and ready to go.  The lesson was an overview of different products to trade in different seasons.  They then went over the biggest trade routes in Kalia, Balthus, Selba, and Cydus, including sea routes.  After Mr. Kiscin was done teaching the class, they all moved down the hall into another classroom.  This class consisted of arithmetic and penmanship while the rest throughout the day focused mainly on the value of products, including how to purchase them at low prices and sell them at high prices for a profit.  By the end of the first day, Traven’s head was swimming with newfound knowledge.