by Vic Connor
The others nod, grinning. All together, they walk toward the tribe’s encampment. Within it, there will be treasure and weapons aplenty—this victory will bring them a lot of gold.
Chapter Four
As the days pass by, Somera struggles to wrap her head around the idea that she has won the scholarship—fees paid, a generous stipend, costs of relocation to San Francisco: a complete free ride for the full duration of the course. And at the end, she’ll have earned a bachelor’s degree in programming and software design and a master’s in RPG creation.
It’s a dream come true. Or it would be a dream come true … except for her family.
The idea of college looms ever larger in her head, her new obsession. The idea of attending classes and meeting the kind of people who make worlds like Arkhart happen, who create whole universes of magic and adventure, is a thrill to her. Learning how to code and program, far more advanced than the simple bits and pieces Altaf has shown her here—and, if she is honest with herself, the idea of earning a fat, Silicon Valley wage at the end of it—is indescribable. She tries to frame it in her mind, to put words to the feeling, but every time she does so she grows shaky, feeling sick with nerves and excitement in equal measure.
She approaches her father. Her mother will never go for it if Somera can’t get her father on her side first, so her plan is to talk to him about the idea of going to college, the same as her brothers, “to make you proud, papa, to make lots of money so I can keep you in luxury in your retirement.”
She practices saying it over and over again, staring at herself in the mirror as she tries to perfect the words and tone. She’ll convince him of the merits of education, which won’t be hard—he was, after all, the man who insisted she continue her lessons until she was seventeen and who pulled strings to secure her a place in one of the best schools in the area.
But a foreign education, in America, in the west … and in computer game creation, of all things. She knows he’d like her to study history or literature so she could become a teacher, or study law like him, or perhaps one of the sciences…
“But papa, coding is a science, it’s one of the most useful sciences going,” she says in front of the mirror, practicing rebuttals to any objection her father might find. And, if all else fails, her parents are very practical people. “I’ll be able to hit a six-figure salary by thirty,” she tells her reflection. “And that’s six figures in US dollars, tens of millions of rupees.”
Finally, after three full days of agonizing over the issue, she approaches her father. The weather is cool and gentle, a perfect spring day, and he’s enjoying a cup of tea on the veranda as he reads the paper after a long day at work. “Papa,” she says to him.
“Somera.” Her father smiles, glancing up at her. He notices the look on her face—the worry, the angst—and his warm smile becomes a frown, worry lacing the lines on his brow. “Somera, darling, whatever is the matter?”
“May I sit down?” she asks.
“What is this? Of course, you can sit down, it’s your bloody house, too.” He chuckles, clearly trying to sound jovial. But his laughter rings hollow, and his voice shakes as he watches her, trying to read her somber tone. Somera takes a chair opposite him, closes her eyes, and takes a deep breath. As she prepares herself, her father says, “Somera, darling, you are worrying me. Whatever it is, just tell me, nothing can be this bad—”
“Papa,” she cuts him off. “Papa, I want to go to college.”
Her father blinks quickly, looking somewhat stunned. For a few seconds, she fears the worst, but he starts to laugh. He chuckles gently at first, then throws his head back, hooting wildly. Finally, after what seems like an age to Somera, he wipes his eyes, gathers himself and nods. “Well, if that’s it … darling, you had me worried.”
“You’re not angry?” she asks.
“Angry? No, of course not. It’s only natural, a bright girl like you.”
“Oh, papa.” She sighs, suddenly exhausted as the pent-up stress of the previous few days begins to lift.
“So, what did you have in mind? The college in town does a couple of decent courses, I’ve heard. Accounting, bookkeeping, things like that. I don’t know how happy they would be taking on a girl in such a course, but I could have a word…”
“Papa, I want to go to America,” she clarifies. “To San Francisco.”
He’s definitely stunned now. Somera’s father gapes at her, his eyes wide and his words seeming to utterly fail him. He opens his mouth to speak a couple of times, chokes, sips some tea and continues to stare.
“There’s an institute there that runs the perfect course for me. The Pixel Academy. It’s coding, like Altaf does, but they have industry contacts, so I’d be able to get a good job right after…” She carries on for the next ten minutes, unloading everything she has been practicing in her mirror. The whole sales pitch.
“I… I do not know, Somera,” her father says finally, shaking his head. “It’s too much. To go alone to such a place… And since when have you been interested in computers?”
“Forever, papa,” she tells him. “You know I used to love to play games.”
“Yes, with Altaf, but that was years ago.”
“But he taught me how to code a little, and I was so good at maths at school.” She does not yet want to tell him about the offer—she knows her parents will object at first, and she has a plan for how to get around them. They’ll build their argument around money, around how expensive American universities are, about how they have already spent so much on their sons’ educations. And then she’ll hit them with it: “Mama, papa, if that’s the only problem, I’ve got a glorious surprise for you.” And she’ll show them the paperwork for her offer, newly printed out, signed and ready to be sent off.
Her father calls her mother out to the veranda and explains the situation, running it all by her in a strained, slightly stunned voice. The more he talks, the more Somera’s mother bristles, her face clouding over and her eyes turning sharp. Neither of them offers so much as a glance at Somera during their conversation.
Finally, her mother turns to Somera, her eyes cold and distant. “No,” she pronounces in a flat voice. “No, I forbid it—”
“But mama—”
“Out of the question, preposterous—”
“But mama—”
“After all the work we’ve put in, trying to find you a husband—”
“Look how well that’s going—”
“Your life is mapped out, sorted, and now this, a spanner in the works—”
“My life isn’t sorted, not even close—”
Her mother glares at her. “What do you mean, not sorted?” she snaps.
“You have my life sorted,” Somera explains, calmly and quietly, yet with a forcefulness she has seldom shown her parents. “You have planned it and mapped it out. It’s your wish that I marry, pop out babies and finish my life before it’s started, stuck in a marriage that I don’t want, living a life which makes no sense to me—”
Her mother scoffs. “No sense?”
“Please, mama, this is important to me,” Somera says. “The only thing I’ve ever wanted to do is work with computers. I want to learn to code, I want a good job. The school I’m looking at will lead to job prospects like you could never dream of—”
“You do not need to work, Somera, that was never—”
“It was never your plan,” Somera finishes. “But it is my plan. And papa,” she adds, looking to her father. “I reckon it was your plan for me to do more than be a housewife, even just a little. Why else did you go to so much effort to get me into school, to have me take my exams?”
Her father nods, coloring slightly. He closes his eyes and sighs. Finally, he whispers, “Yes, Somera, this was my wish. Your brain is too good to be wasted, your mind is too creative. I saw your potential and, yes, my darling, I thought maybe you’d be able to accomplish a great deal.”
Her mother continues to object, of course. She snaps and
she moans and she curses them both for fools. She laments the hard work they’ve put in, the contacts they’ve made so Somera might find a good match. She puts her foot down, glaring at them both.
“I forbid it,” she announces. She points a finger at Somera’s father and narrows her eyes, giving him a deathly stare. “And you forbid it, too. You know what it means, you know how hard it’ll be on her. You know how good her prospects for marriage are right now.”
Somera’s father shrugs and nods. He deliberates, as calm as her mother is wild. “Yes,” he agrees. “I know how good her prospects are. But I know also that nothing is written in stone.” He looks at Somera for a long while before continuing. “You cannot go to America. It’s too much, too far, too dangerous. But we can look at getting you a good education here at home. Let us all take a few days to calm down, see things reasonably, and then we can decide what to do.”
“Calm down?” her mother sputters. “See things reasonably? You’re both so damned soft in the head!” She turns on her heel and storms back into the house. “Soft! Bloody soft!” she shouts back at them over her shoulder as she slams the door behind her.
“Give her time, Somera,” her father says gently. “She’s too strong for her own good, too hard. But she’ll mellow.” He winks at her. “And we will wear her down, gang up on her, what do you think?”
“I think it’s a good idea, papa,” Somera says, tears welling up in her eyes. “Thank you.”
The first step of her plan is going exactly as she thought it would. Just a few days now and she should be able to maneuver them correctly to make it all happen for her.
She doesn’t waste time. That evening, over dinner, she mentions the future jobs she might be able to apply for as a coder. “Of course, they are better paid with an education from the school I’m looking at,” she tells her parents. “Six figures, US dollars, within a couple of years of starting in Silicon Valley.”
“Six figures?” her mother asks. She looks interested despite herself; curious despite her reticence.
“Oh yes, easily,” Somera assures her. “Top-notch programmers like that school can produce are fought over; they’re all millionaires by their mid-thirties. I’d be able to pay for your retirement out of my spare change!” she jokes. “But of course, that’s only the school in San Francisco. I’m sure a local college could put me on… I don’t know, say twenty-thousand dollars. That’s okay, I suppose.”
Her mother remains quiet; her father smiles.
Somera spends the next couple of days drip-feeding them information like that, about how high she could fly after studying in America, about the merits of education for young women in computer sciences. “But it’s still unseemly for a young woman to travel around the world to study like that,” her parents tell her.
“Of course, it’s an uncomfortable idea,” she concedes. “Though I have looked it up. Hundreds of women go from Pakistan every year, traveling to Europe and America to study. Thousands, even. So many, in fact, that the Pakistani community in San Francisco have set up a mosque, a prayer school, and housing for the expatriate students. There is a lovely set of rental properties near the school I was looking at who let rooms out only to young Pakistani girls who have gone over there to study. They all look nice and decent, and the people who run them are good, God-fearing, respectable families from Karachi and Islamabad.”
“Well, I never thought of this,” her father mumbles, looking thoughtful. She knows a little of his resolve is beginning to crumble. “What do you think?” he asks his wife.
She sniffs and shrugs. “I suppose it could be a good idea,” she admits. “It’s a wicked land, and Americans are so obnoxious, it falls on the good and the decent to try to hold them at bay. If it works, I mean,” she adds, looking straight at Somera, clearly not yet accepting the idea as much as her father does.
“If you’d like to know if it works, mama, they have message boards,” Somera explains. “You can send a message asking for information, or even call some of the people who run them. It’s transparent, very twenty-first century.”
Another day passes, and the atmosphere in the house is thick. Somera has caught her parents whispering, arguing, debating a few times. Every spare moment they’ve had, they’ve been discussing the idea, with Somera’s father clearly trying to persuade her mother.
“But, anyway,” her mother finally says. “It all sounds very nice, very good—I wouldn’t say no, I think, except for the price.” She glares at Somera, clearly believing she has won the argument. “I know how much those Americans charge for tuition. And then, the cost of living out there—your father’s rupees wouldn’t go far, I think, on bloody ten-dollar burgers and a thousand-dollar rent. And flights! Another thousand dollars per flight, and could even be two thousand dollars—I did look it up, you know. You’d never get home to visit—even if we could send you in the first place!”
Her father looks disheartened, dismayed that he cannot afford to send his bright young daughter away to study.
“Well,” Somera says, speaking slowly, relishing the fact that she’s finally about to play her trump card. “Since you mention it … there was a competition, for gamers and coders, run by the company who manages the school.”
“What sort of competition?” her father asks.
“The kind I entered,” Somera says vaguely. “The kind that offers you a full scholarship, full stipend for living costs, and money for flights to travel there. A full ride for four years, while you finish your undergraduate and master’s degrees.”
“And…?” her mother asks, her eyes wide, a hand covering her mouth. She looks so vulnerable, Somera’s heart flickers and she almost decides not to continue.
The impulse doesn’t last, however. “And I won it a week ago.” Somera draws out the paperwork—the offer, the contract, the terms and conditions, the confirmation of enrollment—and slides it across the table to her father. Both her parents seem speechless, struck dumb.
“My darling … oh, my darling,” her father whispers after he has read it all. Tears glisten in his eyes and his cheeks turn crimson. “My darling, sweet, beautiful Somera. I am so proud of you.”
By the time her mother has finished reading the pages, her face pales and becomes ashen. She, too, has tears in her eyes and she can’t seem to look at Somera. “You break my heart, going away like this,” she says eventually. “I never thought I’d have to live without you. But you can’t turn such an opportunity down. Go with my blessing, my wonderful, clever girl.”
Then, Somera’s mother begins to weep in earnest, knowing there is no escape: Her child is leaving her, and the pride and the happiness will always fight in her heart with the bitter loneliness of the farewell.
Aremos awakens and the world of Arkhart manifests itself around him, spiraling outward from where he stands as it comes into being. The warband’s usual meeting place looms up ahead, a bawdy tavern in the Witching Woods of the Southfold, a few days ride from the Makers’ Palace. They can always rely on finding a quest or two posted up on the tavern’s notice boards and on mingling with a good crowd around them, bringing them news from every corner of the map.
He’d sent the others a few messages a couple of hours ago, telling them to meet him here at this time. Indeed, while he walks toward the tavern, Sah appears before him, outlined in a white halo as he manifests himself. The halo burns bright for a couple of seconds before dimming down, leaving Aremos’ comrade in place. Sah blinks slightly, looking around to orient himself.
When he sees Aremos approaching, Sah says, “Ah, Aremos. The others are already inside. Come on, let’s get going—I want to hear what has been going on.”
“After you, then,” Aremos replies, following as Sah pushes his way inside the tavern.
Eirrac and Asba sit in one corner at a small table, sipping from mugs of mead. A dense crowd is talking about them in loud voices and, as the throng of people sees Aremos and Sah enter, they begin chattering with even more excitement. Aremos and Sah i
gnore the crowd and join their friends at the back of the room.
“How are you both?” Eirrac asks after greeting them. A barmaid brings over another couple of mugs and hands one each to Aremos and Sah, depleting their coin reserves a little.
“I’ve got news,” Aremos announces. “Big news.”
“Aye, and what is it, then?” Sah draws deeply from his mead and belches loudly.
“I didn’t take the money,” Aremos says. “For the quest. I took the scholarship instead.” He tells them the story of the spirit of the child Somera preparing to travel to the realm of San Francisco to learn from the Pixel Academy. “And who knows?” he adds. “Maybe, one day, this would lead me to transcend from my mortal self to join the ranks of the Makers themselves.”
His warband sits around him, speechless, all staring at him in disbelief.
“You never said so,” Eirrac whispers, finally. “I thought we were all going in for the money.”
“I didn’t want to get my hopes up,” Aremos explains. “It’s a life changing course for me, and I wanted to make sure I had it in place before I could even think about it fully.”
“Well,” Asba says, her sleek, elven features haughty as she attempts a smile. She holds up her tankard and the others follow suit, all of them trying to look as pleased as they can for him. “To Aremos: Maker in training, I suppose,” she says, and they all clink their drinks together.
Aremos raises his own glass, touching it to theirs, but he can’t shake the feeling that they are far less happy than they are making out.
Before he can ask about it, however, a tall, hooded figure approaches their table. It towers over them silently for full five seconds, drawing all attention to itself and commanding silence by the sheer power of its presence. “Aremos,” the newcomer says in a low, dominant voice. “Aremos the Great, Aremos the Wyvern-slayer.”
“Can I help you?” Aremos asks, annoyed at the intrusion but drawn to the mysterious figure despite himself. He can feel the vibrant, carefully restrained energy emanating from the stranger, the capacity for sudden, explosive action. Aremos tenses, bracing himself for any possibility.