“Mother, we talked about this,” Ozorne said. “I am going to be a master mage, remember? I’m not the imperial sort.”
The princess didn’t seem to listen. She turned the wedding ring on her finger, gazing into the distance. Ozorne glanced at a slave, who nodded to him. “Mother, thank you so much for this meal.” The prince got to his feet. Varice and Arram did the same as Ozorne went to his mother, knelt, and kissed her cheek. She didn’t look at him or at the other two as they said their proper farewells and left.
Ozorne sighed. “She has good days and bad ones,” he explained as they walked down the hall. “In the last year she’s been having more good days than bad. She’s just worn out from being at court, or she wouldn’t have slipped away in front of you.”
Varice put an arm around his shoulders and squeezed. “It’s all right,” she said. “She was lovely. We didn’t think anything of it, did we, Arram?”
“No, of course not,” he said, doing his best to sound cheerful, but he was unsettled. From the look of Princess Mahira as she spoke of the Sirajit people, he thought she would have killed them herself, given weapons and soldiers. Her eyes had been frightening.
He needed to break the news now. “Ozorne, one of our new roommates is Sirajit.”
Ozorne halted and turned to look up at Arram. For a moment the older boy said nothing. Finally he looked away. “But how charming. I’m sure we shall all get on like lotuses in a pond. Perhaps complete peace with the province of Siraj will begin in our humble little room. Wouldn’t that be nice?” He sighed. “In any event, you must do without me for another two days. Mother leaves for our lands then. You know I like to stay with her until the last moment. It steadies her, you see.” They nodded, and Ozorne kissed Varice’s cheek in farewell as they left her at her dormitory. “Bear with our new roommates just a little longer,” he said as he and Arram walked on. “We’ll see. Maybe they’ll find out the university is hard on newcomers who think they are already mages.”
He clapped Arram on the shoulder, leaving his friend with goosebumps.
Upon his return to the room, Arram found it crammed with older students, all of whom were laughing and talking loudly, eating and drinking and occupying every spare inch of space. They barely moved as Arram fought his way through to his cubicle. He thought of trying to order them out, then thought of the laughter and mocking he would get. Instead he retrieved his blanket and pillow once again and left. He walked halfway up the steps to the roof before he realized the noisy talk and laughter were also coming from up there.
Growling under his breath, he decided to try something new. When he was in the Lower Academy, he’d been forbidden to venture outside the walls after dark at any time. As a member of the Upper Academy, he was permitted to do so between terms. He stomped out through the gate with a nod to the guard, who knew him, and across the City Road toward the river.
There were people on the beach there. It was too hot for older students and masters to pass up the chance to catch the river breezes, even if they meant to return inside for the night. From his studies with Sebo, Arram knew a track around a bend in the riverbank that led to a small cove. No one else was there.
He put down his blanket and pillow. Next he carefully shaped a circle in the sand around his things, using salt from a pouch that he always wore on his belt. “Let them take your clothes,” Cosmas had told the three friends. “Let them take your rings, let them take your shoes, let them take your…” He had twinkled at Ozorne. “Let them take the very beads from your hair, but do not let them take your salt! It is the most basic ingredient we have, and it can help you to get everything else back!”
Arram used it now because, while there were spells to prevent hippos and crocodiles from coming up on these beaches, there were always land animals to concern him. As he walked the circle, he murmured a protective spell. To his delight, the line of sparkling fire rose above his circle and faded. It worked!
He lay down and tucked his hands behind his head, watching the stars and listening to the river’s sounds. Hippos talked back and forth as softly as those great creatures managed. Now and then crocodiles bellowed. Fish leaped to catch insects and splashed back down. Clouds passed. He counted the constellations, starting with the Basilisk and moving on to the others, also reciting the magical influences attached to each one. At some point in his whispered recitations, he slept.
He dreamed he lay on a heap of sleeping dragons. Their skins were as lumpy and uncomfortable as rocks, and they stank. When one of them sighed in his ear, he woke up enough to object.
He’d flung an arm and a leg onto the bronze back of the giant crocodile god, Enzi, in his sleep. The creature’s immense forearm was Arram’s pillow. The stench in his dream came from the animal’s mouth, filled with sharp teeth.
The youth scrambled to his hands and knees, wheezing as he fought for breath. When he glanced at Enzi, he saw that one of the god’s golden eyes was open. The moment he met that ancient gaze, he froze.
You woke me, the god said. We both slept well, and you woke me. He released the spell of paralysis that held Arram. Why must you flail so?
“I didn’t expect company!” Arram squeaked. He cursed his voice, then wondered what he had done wrong on his protective circle. He looked and saw one problem immediately. The god lay on half of it.
Do you know how little rest I get from the endless complaints of my own people and the hippopotamus people? demanded the god. Clatter, clatter, we are hungry, the humans hunt us, your people eat our young. I find a nice place to nap and you woke me! Go away if you can’t lie still! The great eye slid shut.
“It’s not my fault,” Arram grumbled, yanking on his clothes. He would have to get another blanket. He was not waking the god for the one underneath him. He marched up the path to the university. “I didn’t invite him to sleep there. It was my protective circle he ruined! He has things to complain about! He doesn’t have to remake his life every year or two, or every few weeks….” He stopped. He had spoken with a god. Admittedly, Enzi was an earth god, not one of the Great Gods, who had their own separate realm, but how many people spoke with gods at all?
Would Sebo be angry? It wasn’t his fault that Enzi had crawled into his circle. And so much for thinking he could work a good circle—he needed to practice!
He had planned to see if Hulak wanted weeds pulled after he ate breakfast, but his meal was interrupted. He was about to dig into a very succulent piece of cantaloupe when something like a cool, tingling rope twined around his neck. His tablemates stared at him.
“Arram,” Varice said nervously.
He didn’t have to be able to see the Gift to know the person who wielded it. “Sebo,” he told her and the others, and tried to fit a bite into his mouth. The rope around his throat tightened gently and got cold. “I’d better see her.”
Once he was on his feet and outside, the grip on his throat released. He could barely see the rope stretching through the air ahead of him, leading him through the Water Gate. It didn’t show the way to Sebo’s hut, but took him instead to the riverbank. Sebo waited for him there, cooling her feet in the water.
“You are a lucky boy,” she informed him when he was within earshot. “Do you know what might have happened, had Enzi not been amused rather than angry? He is capricious! You trusted protective circles—the university’s and your own—to keep you safe from the god of the crocodiles!”
Arram blinked at her. “I thought it was a good circle,” he said mildly, ignoring his own vexation at his failure. The air was damp and chilly, which meant the old woman’s bones were hurting her. “Doesn’t the water make your feet hurt?”
She sighed, her rage seeping into the sand. “It’s warmer than the air,” she explained. “It isn’t just we humans and the big animals who have their own gods. The great things of this world—rivers, mountains, lakes, forests—have their own gods as well. The very large ones have more than one god. Old Zekoi is one, because the rivers and streams that come to him
have their own gods. If you deal with one god—as you now have—you will see others. Treat them with respect if they come to you. Most will not say as much, but they are often called to battle against Uusoae, the Queen of Chaos. Our tribute, prayers, and respect give them strength to keep fighting, somehow.”
Arram frowned. “I thought Uusoae was just a tale to frighten children.”
Suddenly Enzi was there on the riverbank. The air shoved away from him, making Sebo and Arram stagger. Arram caught his master by the arm, but she shook him off.
Do not speak so of the Dread Queen. She would devour us all if she had the chance, Enzi said harshly. The gods hold her at bay, but she never stops planning how she will eat the world.
“We fight beside you, in our way,” Sebo told the giant crocodile. “It is our world, too.”
He will be called to the fore of the battle one day, Enzi said, looking at Arram. He had better be ready.
“What do I need to be ready?” Arram asked, but the god had vanished. “I can’t battle any Chaos Queen,” he told Sebo. “I can’t even fight bullies.”
She took him by the arm. “Study your lessons and practice your spells,” she said gently. “That’s all that can be asked of you right now. Come. Let’s walk the river.”
After he left her, he was completely absorbed in thinking about gods that did not take on the faces of human beings. Once he had bathed, he spent the rest of the morning in a library that specialized in books about religion, gods, and nonhuman creatures. He had plenty to turn over in his mind when he left, three books in his hands.
THE IMPERIAL UNIVERSITY OF CARTHAK
The School for Mages
The Upper Academy
SCHEDULE OF STUDY, AUTUMN TERM, 437 H.E.
Student: Arram Draper
Learning Level: Semi-Independent
Second Morning Bell
Stone Magic—Yadeen
Third Morning Bell
Fire Magic—Cosmas, breakfast supplied
Morning Classes
Advanced Law with Regard to Magecraft—Third-year instructors
Tribal Magic—Various instructors
Medicines—Ramasu, instructors
Lunch—Noon Bell
Afternoon Classes
Advanced Charms—Fourth-year instructors
Illusions: Birds—Dagani
Water Magic—Sebo
Plants—Hulak
Supper—Seventh Afternoon Bell
Extra Study at Need
Ozorne returned the day before class began with a pair of slaves carrying a trunk of gifts and new clothes from his mother. Fortunately, Diop and Laman were out, receiving their final schedule for their first term of classes. Arram was reading peacefully on his bed. He was so grateful to see Ozorne that he hugged him.
“Easy, old man!” Ozorne said cheerfully. “You’d think I was gone for an eternity!”
Arram let him go. “It felt like one.”
“Oh?” Ozorne waved off the slaves and flopped onto his bed. “Tell me.”
Arram waved a hand in dismissal. “It’s just boring without you.”
Ozorne pulled up a chair and slouched on it, crossing his legs. “Here’s some cheer. Since Mother was inclined to spend and we even went to a bookseller, I got this for you.” He reached over, opened the trunk, and tossed a book to Arram. It was about shapeshifters.
They were both looking at the many-colored illustrations when the door swung open. Diop and Laman had returned.
“Mithros bless us, another one,” Laman said. “Had I known this place was degenerating into a school for children, I might have tried for the City of the Gods.”
“They say the school in Jindazhen is incredible,” Diop drawled, leaning against the frame. “Bamboo groves, teahouses with singing girls who are happy to keep a fellow company, food better than the slop they serve here…”
“You must be the leftover prince,” Laman taunted Ozorne.
Ozorne looked at Arram. “Great Mithros,” he said. “I thought at least they’d be witty.” Then he smiled at the older boys. “I have a long memory,” he said. “I don’t know why I’m telling you, but there it is. You’d do well to keep it in mind.”
“Is that a threat?” Laman asked with delight. “Are you threatening us, little man?”
“I am explaining,” Ozorne replied. “Isn’t that enough?”
The older boys burst into laughter. Arram burned silently. It was bad enough when they laughed at him. He was used to it. But they had no call to laugh at his friend. They didn’t understand what Ozorne had to live with—a murdered father, a mother who didn’t always live in the real world, and people like these newcomers who jeered because he wasn’t the direct heir to the throne.
“Stop it!” Arram said, getting to his feet. Sweat rolled down his face. “He’s a prince of the realm—you owe him that much respect!”
They only laughed harder. “What can you do, little boy?” Diop managed to say.
“He’ll run and tell his mama!” Laman said, gasping.
Arram clenched his fists. “Shut up!” he cried. “Can’t you ever shut up?” He didn’t realize that bits of smoke were drifting up all around him.
Ozorne lunged to his feet, grabbed the water pitcher from Arram’s desk, and—to the sound of their roommates’ laughter—threw the contents over him. Drenched, his concentration broken, Arram gasped for air and found none. He began to cough.
Diop and Laman stopped laughing. “This is pathetic,” Laman said. “We have to get rid of you two. Mop up that mess when you’re done.” They left, slamming the door behind them. Apparently they didn’t notice that the “mess” was evaporating from the floor in small clouds of steam.
“I almost lost my grip, didn’t I?” Arram asked when he could breathe.
“I was impressed,” Ozorne told him. “I thought you would set the room on fire.”
When Arram moved, they found he had left the outlines of his feet burned into the wood of the floor.
They waited until the supper bell chimed, but no one banged on the door, demanding to know who had practiced magic without leave. It was the first time one of Arram’s slips had gone unnoticed by authority. For some reason, Diop and Laman chose not to report it, which pleased Ozorne.
When they reached the Upper Academy dining hall, they saw that Varice had already found a table—and new friends to share it with her. Arram actually ground his teeth.
Ozorne sighed. “She’s kept our usual places for us. We may as well show them we knew her first.”
They approached with their meals, and Varice waved to them. “Here are my friends,” she told her newest companions. “Prince Ozorne, Arram, these are…”
Laman, Diop, and their other two friends introduced themselves reluctantly. Diop even said, “We’ve met.”
“Laman and Diop are our roommates,” Ozorne explained as he took his seat. “I just had the pleasure of meeting them today.”
Arram caught Varice’s quick glance from Ozorne to the newcomers. “Well, you might as well get acquainted now,” she told them as Arram sat and dug into his food. “If this summer was any indication, the Upper Academy won’t leave us much time to chat.”
“You two curmudgeons never mentioned you had such a lovely friend,” Laman said, smiling at Varice. “Otherwise we might have been more polite to you.”
Arram watched the meal in silent appreciation as Varice got the new students to talk about themselves and to ask Ozorne about the university. She charmed them, and guided that charm Ozorne’s way as surely as if she wielded magic. Arram was grateful she didn’t turn that his way. He wasn’t certain he could endure the sparkling eyes, the flawless smile, and the attention that had to be for him only. She applied it as easily as Yadeen applied his Gift to the inside of a marble boulder, making each of the young men beam at her and at each other. Even Ozorne, who should have been immune after all this time, ended the meal graciously.
“There, you see?” Varice asked her two friends as
they left the dining hall. “A little pleasantry over food, and people see one another in a much better light. So I can invite them tomorrow?”
Ozorne sighed. “You know we can’t deny you anything,” he said, and kissed her cheek. “But if they get nasty…”
“Then we’re done,” she promised. “But when you’re a great prince with a house of your own, you’ll see this is a good way to do things.”
Ozorne smiled. “When I have a house and lands, I hope you two are there to guide me. Being without you both these last few days has shown me how much better I do around you. It seems as if I’m in control of things knowing you’re at my side.”
“The three of us—we’re invincible,” Varice announced, spinning around. “The world had best watch out!”
When the boys returned to their room to study, they found Diop and Laman had invited a number of their new friends to do the same. The older boys took up every space but Arram’s and Ozorne’s beds and, despite the fact that they were supposed to be studying, made plenty of noise. Finally Ozorne looked at Arram, shrugged, and glanced toward the door. That became the pattern for their evenings: they would retreat to a library to work with Varice, then run to their rooms to be in bed before curfew rang out. Their closeness made it easier for Arram to bear the older boys’ dismissal.
As the term continued, Varice and Ozorne invited other friends they made to join their group at meals and library sessions. Their numbers always came and went in the library: it seemed few older students appreciated asking for help from the three younger ones. Some remained.
One evening when Varice and Ozorne had gone in search among the shelves for illusions on roses, one of the other students slipped into Ozorne’s empty seat beside Arram. He blinked at her, brought out of his intense concentration on the laws regarding magic use in Tyra. Prisca, he thought, dazed. Her name is Prisca.