The Reluctant Assassin Boxset

by Thomas K. Carpenter

  Heads turned and eyes creased at the corners. There was a sense of anticipation about this challenge, but Zayn didn't think it'd be as easy as people thought, especially when he checked the faces of the fifth years, who smirked quietly in the back.

  "Point three. You will be placed in teams. While the term assassin conjures the image of a lone specialist wreaking havoc upon their target, the truth is more complicated. If you are talented enough to graduate from the Academy, you will find that surviving the challenges of the real world takes a team. If you cannot learn to work in a team in your first year, then there is no hope for you and you will not graduate. Also, whoever the last-place team is at the moment will serve the other teams during all mealtimes, and clean up afterwards. If you don't want to be a kitchen steward, pay attention and excel.

  "I'm not going to ask if you understand. It is up to you to figure it out, so learn to pay attention, it may save your life someday.

  "Alright, Mr. Ten," said Instructor Allgood, "you get first pick. Each of you will get four choices."

  A sea of eager faces looked back at him. The other captains were looking at the board, but Zayn watched the other first years. He already knew who he was going to pick and had an inkling of how poorly it was going to be received.

  Zayn called out, "Portia Rodriguez."

  One of the other captains to his right spoke, Eddie perhaps. "But she's only a four."

  There were more than a few disdainful glares in his direction from the other first years. Many of them had expected to be picked first. He hoped this wouldn't make things more difficult during the school year, but he also didn't care.

  When Zayn made no move to change his mind, the fifth year at the wipe board wrote her name beneath his. Portia joined him at the front while the others made their picks.

  Portia had a plump figure that made her look fourteen. She looked bewildered at being picked first and mumbled a gracias in a thick Mexican accent before taking her position behind him.

  When it came back to him, Zayn called out, "Vin Moretti."

  "A damn three," said Eddie, shaking his head. "I love this guy."

  Vin lumbered over to them. Like Portia, he looked a bit unsure of why he was chosen. Keelan gave him a hands spread questioning stare, but Zayn shook him off.

  While the other picks were being made, Instructor Allgood pulled him aside. "You are aware that it's customary to pick the top scores for your team. In fact, it's more than customary, it's a wise choice, because this first test is usually a good measure of how a student will do. You're not trying to sabotage this, are you? I am aware of your initial reluctance at coming here and the constraints of being from Varna."

  "I'm not sabotaging anything," said Zayn earnestly. "And I'm not reluctantly here."

  "If so, then act like it," he said.

  When it came time to make his fourth pick, he grimaced because he knew the reception it would receive.

  "Skylar Chu."

  "A two, he picked a damn two. Wonders will never cease," said Eddie.

  As the other students shook their heads, Skylar Chu tiptoed over and joined them. She was on the verge of tears.

  She whispered, "Thank you?"

  The last pick came quickly, but before Zayn could say a name, Instructor Allgood stepped forward and said, "Since you're not taking this seriously, you don't get a last pick. One of the other teams can have an extra."

  Zayn faced Instructor Allgood. "I am taking this seriously. I should get a last pick since I had the top score."

  "The evidence shows otherwise by your complete lack of judgment or common sense," said Instructor Allgood, gripping his staff so hard his knuckles cracked. "To me it looks like you're trying to throw this, and if that's what you want to do, I'll help you out. You and your team can have the storage room next to the kitchens to sleep rather than a real room."

  Zayn stepped towards the instructor. "You asked me to bring back something of value and I did. Then you asked me to pick a team without stating the criteria that you thought I should be picking by. Now that I have, you're taking my last pick and giving us a storage closet to sleep in. This isn't right."

  As soon as he said the last words, he knew he'd gone too far. The claw-ended staff hit Zayn around the midsection, throwing him across the room.

  Though it seemed impossible that he could have moved that fast, Instructor Allgood was glowering over him as he slid into the wall. Zayn remained as still as possible, hoping to avoid further beatings.

  Instructor Allgood addressed the group, "Let this be a lesson to everyone. I don't give a crap what you think. You're here to learn, not to have an opinion. On the rare occasions that your opinion matters, I will let you know, but until that point, keep it to your damn self."

  After the instructor dismissed the others and then promptly left, Zayn was alone in the dojo. He stared at the chalkboard for a while, especially at the low scores of his teammates, hoping he'd made the right evaluations about who he thought they were. If he was wrong, it was going to be a long year.

  Chapter Seven

  The Hold, September 2013

  Realizing that gold paint covers bruises well

  Carrying out a plan was one thing. Convincing the others involved that it made sense was a whole other thing.

  Zayn limped to his new quarters, cringing every time he put his right foot down. He found the rest of his team staring into a storage room jammed with old tables, chairs, and kitchen equipment. The three sets of eyes regarded him with less than enthusiasm.

  "You're probably wondering why I picked you," said Zayn, holding his side.

  Vin stepped forward. "No, I'm wondering why you screwed us. If you'd let us be picked normally, we'd have been picked last, but we'd have been on a team with a chance. With only four, we're totally up a creek without a barn door."

  Zayn blinked a few times, trying to process if Vin had meant to mix up his metaphors, before responding, "We would have been fine if Instructor Allgood hadn't taken our last pick."

  "Don't be a cabeza gruesa," said Portia, her thick accent barely making her understood as she faced off with Vin. "He got highest score possible and he pick you, and now you ungrateful?"

  "You're damn right I'm ungrateful. You heard Instructor Allgood, he doesn't want to be here, or something like that," said Vin.

  Portia turned to Zayn. "Do you want to be here?"

  "Yes," said Zayn.

  She threw her arm in his direction while addressing Vin. "See! He said he wants to be here. I do not care what that instructor said. He picked us for his team, so I am on his side."

  "That's because he picked you first!" said Vin.

  Skylar crossed her arms. "Why did you pick us? Tell us, because nothing makes sense otherwise."

  "I'll tell you if you answer why you brought back a handful of change when I saw you lift the wallets of at least three other students," said Zayn. "You could have brought back anything, but you purposely sandbagged."

  Skylar blushed, put a hand to her chin. "I wouldn't do that, and I didn't steal anything."

  "Same with you, Vin. You purposely antagonized Instructor Allgood, so he'd give you a low score. Plus you brought back a bunch of used books you can get for the change that Skylar stole."

  Vin made a face, shaking his head.

  "And I saw the way you talked to everyone, glad handling them like an experienced politician. If you can do that to your fellow students, you should have been able to navigate Allgood," said Zayn.

  "What about her?" asked Vin, gesturing towards Portia. "She hasn't done anything." His forehead wrinkled. "And I didn't even know she spoke English until now."

  Zayn held his hands out. "Exactly. She was playing on everyone's expectations. No one wants a teammate you can't talk to."

  Portia glanced to the side with a sly grin, confirming what he'd just said.

  "But you still haven't explained why we would do that," said Skylar.

  "You did it so you'd get on a better team. If everyone ge
ts judged correctly, then no one really has an advantage between the teams. But let's say your last pick is really a seven or eight, rather than the two they want you to think they are. Wouldn't that make a team stronger?" He paused. "Unless someone saw through the ruse and picked you anyway. The way I saw it, I was getting all the top students, until Instructor Allgood ruined it."

  Vin glanced cagily at the others. "I'm not sure about that. Seems like a risky strategy, especially on the first day in the Hall."

  Skylar opened her mouth to answer, then her head whipped to the right, looking into the cluttered storage room.

  She said, "Does anyone know how to perform an exorcism?"

  "What?" said everyone else.

  Skylar pointed into the back of the room, where something luminous was hiding behind the clutter. It had the vague appearance of a human being, but something about the shape was off.

  "Exorcism? That's for people possessed by demons. I think that's a ghost, which means you want a banishing," said Vin.

  "That's not a ghost," said Portia. "We had one that haunted my father's restaurant. They don't put off light like that."

  Everyone looked to Zayn. He held his hands up. "Don't look at me, we didn't have anything like that in Varna. It's just a boring piece of backwater Alabama."

  That wasn't true by any means, but Zayn didn't want any more questions about his past or why he'd come to the Hundred Halls. Portia gave him the side eye, as if she knew better, but she was kind enough not to call him out.

  "It's gone," said Skylar.

  "Yeah, I don't see it either," said Vin.

  "We should really get this cleaned out," said Zayn. "I don't think any of us have slept in days, and we won't until we finish this."

  "What about the glowy thing in the room?" asked Skylar.

  "If it were dangerous, they wouldn't put us in here," said Zayn.

  "Are you sure about that?" asked Vin.

  "No," said Zayn, "but I'm not about to march up to Instructor Allgood and demand a new room now."

  The threat of the instructor's wrath seemed to outweigh the threat of the thing in the room, so everyone got to work moving the old furniture out. Zayn's sore ribs made it hard to breathe and lifting anything heavy made him nauseous from the pain, but he'd caused his teammates enough problems, so he kept his mouth shut.

  It took hours to empty the storage room. When they were done, they acquired cleaning supplies from the kitchen and scrubbed down every grimy surface. The back and forth motion was worse than lifting heavy desks. It felt like someone had left a half-dozen rusty staples in his side where Instructor Allgood had hit him with the staff.

  By the time they finished it was late into the night. Instructor Allgood had promised them an early morning, so everyone collapsed on their beds. Skylar was asleep first, and snored like a chainsaw.

  Try as he might, Zayn couldn't fall asleep. He tossed and turned for hours, trying to find a different position that would help him doze, but he'd been thinking about the Hundred Halls for years, and now that he was here, his thoughts and dreams were swirling in his head like a fretful whirlwind. He had so much to learn, so many things to do, and he was dying to get started.

  Chapter Eight

  The Hold, October 2013

  Learning how to foul up his words

  Classes for the first few months were relentless. Zayn and his fellow first years stumbled from lesson to lesson, trying to keep up with everything the instructors were throwing at them. They had kickboxing lessons for three hours every morning, a list of spells they had to memorize and demonstrate each afternoon, and other assorted tasks given by Instructor Allgood with the kind of glee reserved for sadistic headsmen. All this Zayn and his team had to do while keeping up with the chores they'd earned from being the bottom team. But despite the pace, Zayn loved it.

  When they found out they'd be skipping kickboxing with Instructor Allgood that morning and getting another lesson from Instructor Pennywhistle, everyone was excited. Not only because their legs were so tight they could be used to launch rocks like a catapult, but because everyone loved classes with Instructor Pennywhistle.

  When Pennywhistle sauntered in the room everyone put away their phones and sat up. She dressed and moved like a 1950s movie star with a tight black skirt and kitten-soft aqua sweater. Her skin was like pale milk and appeared so supple that she would bruise merely from being touched. The way everyone stopped what they were doing to stare at her entrance each time they had class had started the rumor that she had succubus genes.

  "Good evening," she said with a grin, exposing perfect, pearly white teeth. "While you still serve and eat dinner like a bunch of savages, we're moving on to a new lesson. Tonight we shall work on those disgusting accents that are fouling up your words."

  "But I don't have an accent where I'm from," said Charla, leaning into her Southern twang and winking at the class.

  Instructor Pennywhistle approached Charla's table. There was a sparkle in her eye that always made Zayn feel like she was the wolf dressed up like the grandmother in Red Riding Hood.

  "My dear Charla," said Instructor Pennywhistle, "you don't have an accent. You have a sign around your neck every time you speak that says 'I'm an uncultured buffoon who shouldn't be trusted to pour water and is probably racist.'"

  The class burst into laughter. Charla's face grew bright red.

  "I wouldn't laugh. The rest of you are no better," said Instructor Pennywhistle, wandering to another table. "When our dear Eddie Lynn speaks, what do you all think?"

  Someone shouted from the back, "He's an asshole."

  True to form, he started to rise from his chair as if he were going to start a fight, but Instructor Pennywhistle placed her hand on his shoulder, keeping him seated.

  Next she placed her hand over Portia's head.

  "Zayn. What do you think of Portia's accent? What does it tell you?"

  His mouth went dry. "I don't know."

  "Of course you do," she replied, then turned her head towards the class. "If we cannot be honest with each other, no matter how much it hurts, we cannot improve. So, Mister Carter, what does Portia's accent say to you, a young man from the South."

  The way Portia was looking at him made him feel about two inches tall.

  He closed his eyes as he said, "That's she's probably a part of a gang or something."

  "And what if it were more Spanish sounding?" she asked.

  "Sexier," said Zayn, peeking with one eye.

  "I'm not here to change society's opinion of what your accent means to them. Neither should you care, because those accents, in time, will become a tool. But before you can use them as a tool, you must build up the muscles in your mouth. Your whole life, you've been speaking one way, and your mouth, tongue, and lips are trained to that way. Tonight we're going to start working on the muscles that you're not using with some articulation exercises. I want you to start by touching the bottoms and tops of your teeth with the tip of your tongue like this."

  Instructor Pennywhistle extended her neck and ran her tongue along her top and bottom teeth.

  "Instructor Pennywhistle," said Marla, a dark-haired girl from Keelan's team. "Isn't there a spell that can do this? Make us talk without an accent, or in another language?"

  "There are spells that can quickly give you the knowledge necessary to communicate in another language," she said. "But what you must learn is how to convince someone that you are from that country, and not only that country, but a specific region, maybe even a particular town and class level. For example, since we have three students from the South, can you hear the differences between them?"

  "Yeah," said Eddie. "Charla's the rich girl and the other two are poor as pisswater."

  "Thank you, Eddie, for once again proving the point about your accent," said Instructor Pennywhistle.

  The corners of his eyes creased as he tried to figure out if he'd been insulted while the rest of the class chuckled behind their cupped hands. He opened his mouth to s
ay something, but hunched his head instead. A word from Instructor Pennywhistle, and Eddie would be breathing from a straw during the next lesson in the dojo.

  The class settled into mouth muscle exercises. Instructor Pennywhistle gave them a list of them to practice three times a day for at least an hour. Zayn didn't know where they were going to manufacture this time, except by cutting out more sleep.

  It was nearing the end of class when a piercing scream froze everyone in their tracks. Everyone's head turned towards the door to Instructor Allgood's room, which was now open. The screams were coming from inside.

  The class hurried towards the door, but no one went in. Adrian Parker, a guy from Charla's team, was lying on the ground with his eyes wide open. The screams were not coming from him, but an owl figurine on the table next to the box of named coins.

  "Oh, god," said Marla, pointing at Adrian. "His skin looks like it's boiling."

  "Back away, everyone," said Instructor Pennywhistle.

  She made a few rapid gestures, so quick and precise like a surgeon, completely antithetical to her demeanor, that Zayn realized the calm persona of Instructor Pennywhistle was merely a front.

  Sparks exploded around the doorframe when she finished the spell, eliciting cries of surprise from everyone.

  "Hand me a staff," she said, snapping her fingers.

  Someone grabbed a staff from the rack of weapons. She hooked the fallen student's leg and dragged him out of the room. It took her three spells to get his skin to stop boiling. When she was finished, she pulled a whistle from her pocket and blew it. No sound came out.

  A minute later, a couple of fifth years appeared with a stretcher. Instructor Pennywhistle helped them load Adrian onto it, and then they headed towards the portal.

  When they were gone, Instructor Pennywhistle turned towards them, a somber expression on her face.

  "If you were wondering why we have taught you few spells so far, this should be your answer. Knowing a spell and knowing how and when to use it are two different things. That stupid fool tried to put an undetectable charm on himself, thinking that would be enough to bypass Instructor Allgood's traps. Despite the reputation of our hall, we pride ourselves on not wasting our students carelessly like the other majors."