I took another deep breath, closed my eyes and concentrated. After a long moment, I felt the cool impassivity of the Heart of Stone surround me. My trembling stopped.
I opened my eyes and heard my own voice say, “I had permission for my use of sympathy, sir.”
The Chancellor gave me a long, hard look before saying, “What?”
I held the Heart of Stone around me like a calming mantle. “I had permission from Master Hemme, both express and implied.”
The masters stirred in their seats, puzzled.
The Chancellor looked far from pleased. “Explain yourself.”
“I approached Master Hemme after his first lecture and told him I was already familiar with the concepts he had discussed. He told me we would discuss it the next day.
“When he arrived for class the next day, he announced that I would be giving the lecture in order to demonstrate the principles of sympathy. After observing what materials were available, I gave the class the first demonstration my master gave me.” Not true, of course. As I’ve already mentioned, my first lesson involved a handful of iron drabs. It was a lie, but a plausible lie.
Judging by the masters’ expressions, this was news to them. Somewhere deep in the Heart of Stone, I relaxed, glad that the master’s irritation was based on Hemme’s angrily abridged version of the truth.
“You gave a demonstration before the class?” the Chancellor asked before I could continue. He glanced at Hemme, then back to me.
I played innocent. “Just a simple one. Is that unusual?”
“It is a little odd,” he said, looking at Hemme. I could sense his anger again, but this time it didn’t seem to be directed at me.
“I thought it might be the way you proved your knowledge of the material and moved to a more advanced class,” I said innocently. Another lie, but again, plausible.
Elxa Dal spoke up, “What did the demonstration involve?”
“A wax doll, a hair from Hemme’s head, and a candle. I would have picked a different example, but my materials were limited. I thought that might be another part of the test, making do with what you were given.” I shrugged again. “I couldn’t think of any other way to demonstrate all three laws with the materials on hand.”
The Chancellor looked at Hemme. “Is what the boy says true?”
Hemme opened his mouth as if he would deny it, then apparently remembered that an entire classroom full of students had witnessed the exchange. He said nothing.
“Damn it, Hemme,” Elxa Dal burst out. “You let the boy make a simulacra of you, then bring him here on malfeasance?” He spluttered. “You deserve worse than you got.”
“E’lir Kvothe could not have hurt him with just a candle,” Kilvin muttered. He gave his fingers a puzzled look, as if he were working something out in his head. “Not with hair and wax. Maybe blood and clay…”
“Order.” The Chancellor’s voice was too quiet to be called a shout, but it carried the same authority. He shot looks at Elxa Dal and Kilvin. “Kvothe, answer Master Kilvin’s question.”
“I made a second binding between the candle and a brazier to illustrate the Law of Conservation.”
Kilvin didn’t look up from his hands. “Wax and hair?” He grumbled as if not entirely satisfied with my explanation.
I gave a half-puzzled, half-embarrassed look and said, “I don’t understand it myself, sir. I should have gotten ten percent transference at best. It shouldn’t have been enough to blister Master Hemme, let alone burn him.”
I turned to Hemme. “I really didn’t mean any harm, sir,” I said in my best distraught voice. “It was just supposed to be a bit of a hotfoot to make you jump. The fire hadn’t been going more than five minutes, and I didn’t imagine that a fresh fire at ten percent could hurt you.” I even wrung my hands a little, every bit the distraught student. It was a good performance. My father would have been proud.
“Well it did,” Hemme said bitterly. “And where is the damn mommet anyway? I demand you return it at once!”
“I’m afraid I can’t, sir. I destroyed it. It was too dangerous to leave lying around.”
Hemme gave me a shrewd look. “It’s of no real concern,” he muttered.
The Chancellor took up the reins again. “This changes things considerably. Hemme, do you still set grievance against Kvothe?”
Hemme glared and said nothing.
“I move to strike both grievances,” Arwyl said. The physicker’s old voice coming as a bit of a surprise. “If Hemme set him in front of the class, he gave permission. And it isn’t malfeasance if you give him your hair and watch him stick it on the mommet’s head.”
“I expected him to have more control over what he was doing,” Hemme said, shooting a venomous look at me.
“It’s not malfeasance,” Arwyl said doggedly, glaring at Hemme from behind his spectacles, the grandfatherly lines on his face forming a fierce scowl.
“It would fall under reckless use of sympathy,” Lorren interjected coolly.
“Is that a motion to strike the previous two grievances and replace them with reckless use of sympathy?” asked the Chancellor, trying to regain a semblance of formality.
“Aye,” said Arwyl, still glaring fearsomely at Hemme through his spectacles.
“All for the motion?” The Chancellor said,
There was a chorus of ayes from everyone but Hemme.
“Against?”
Hemme remained silent.
“Master Archivist, what is the discipline for reckless use of sympathy?”
“If one is injured by reckless use of sympathy, the offending student will be whipped, singly, no more than seven times across the back.” I wondered what book Master Lorren was reciting from.
“Number of lashes sought?”
Hemme looked at the other masters’ faces, realizing the tide had turned against him. “My foot is blistered halfway to my knee,” he gritted. “Three lashes.”
The Chancellor cleared his throat. “Does any master oppose this action?”
“Aye,” Elxa Dal and Kilvin said together.
“Who wishes to suspend the discipline? Vote by show of hands.”
Elxa Dal, Kilvin, and Arwyl raised their hands at once, followed by the Chancellor. Mandrag kept his hand down, as did Lorren, Brandeur, and Hemme. Elodin grinned at me cheerily, but did not raise his hand. I kicked myself for my recent trip to the Archives and the bad impression it made on Lorren. If not for that he might have tipped things in my favor.
“Four and a half in favor of suspending punishment,” the Chancellor said after a pause. “The discipline stands: three lashes to be served tomorrow, the third of Equis, at noon.”
As I was deep into the Heart of Stone, all I felt was a slight analytical curiosity about what it would be like to be publicly whipped. All the masters showed signs of preparing to stand and leave, but before things could be called to a close I spoke up, “Chancellor?”
He took a deep breath and let it out in a gush. “Yes?”
“During my admission, you said that my admittance to the Arcanum was granted, contingent upon proof that I had mastered the basic principles of sympathy.” I quoted him nearly word for word. “Does this constitute proof?”
Both Hemme and the Chancellor opened their mouths to say something. Hemme was louder. “Look here, you little cocker!”
“Hemme!” the Chancellor snapped. Then he turned to me, “I’m afraid proof of mastery requires more than a simple sympathetic binding.”
“A double binding,” Kilvin corrected gruffly.
Elodin spoke, seeming to startle everyone at the table. “I can think of students currently enrolled in the Arcanum who would be hard pressed to complete a double binding, let alone draw enough heat to ‘blister a man’s foot to the knee.’” I had forgotten how Elodin’s light voice moved through the deep places in your chest when he spoke. He smiled happily at me again.
There was a moment of quiet reflection.
“True enough,” admitted Elx
a Dal, giving me a close look.
The Chancellor looked down at the empty table for a minute. Then he shrugged, looked up, and gave a surprisingly jaunty smile. “All in favor of admitting first-term student Kvothe’s reckless use of sympathy as proof of mastery of the basic principles of sympathy vote by show of hands.”
Kilvin and Elxa Dal raised their hands together. Arwyl added his a moment later. Elodin waved. After a pause, the Chancellor raised his hand as well, saying “Five and a half in favor of Kvothe’s admission to the Arcanum. Motion passed. Meeting dismissed. Tehlu shelter us, fools and children all.” He said the last very softly as he rested his forehead against the heel of his hand.
Hemme stormed out of the room with Brandeur in tow. Once they were through the door I heard Brandeur ask, “Weren’t you wearing a gram?”
“No, I wasn’t.” Hemme snapped. “And don’t take that tone with me, as if this were my fault. You might as well blame someone stabbed in an alley for not wearing armor.”
“We should all take precautions.” Brandeur said, placatingly. “You know as well as—” Their voices were cut off with the sound of a door closing.
Kilvin stood and shrugged his shoulders, stretching. Looking over to where I stood, he scratched his bushy beard with both hands, a thoughtful look on his face, then strode over to where I stood. “Do you have your sygaldry yet, E’lir Kvothe?”
I looked at him blankly. “Do you mean runes, sir? I’m afraid not.”
Kilvin ran his hands through his beard, thoughtfully. “Do not bother with the Basic Artificing class you have signed for. Instead you will come to my workroom tomorrow. Noon.”
“I’m afraid I have another appointment at noon, Master Kilvin.”
“Hmmm. Yes.” He frowned. “First bell, then.”
“I’m afraid the boy will be having an appointment with my folk shortly after the whipping, Kilvin,” Arwyl said with a glimmer of amusement in his eyes. “Have someone bring you to the Medica afterward, son. We’ll stitch you back together.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Arwyl nodded and made his way out of the room.
Kilvin watched him go, then turned to look at me. “My workshop. Day after tomorrow. Noon.” The tone of his voice implied that it wasn’t really a question.
“I would be honored, Master Kilvin.”
He grunted in response and left with Elxa Dal.
That left me alone with the still-seated Chancellor. We stared at each other while the sound of footsteps faded in the hallway. I brought myself back up out of the Heart of Stone and felt a tangle of anticipation and fear at everything that had just happened.
“I’m sorry to be so much trouble so soon, sir.” I offered hesitantly.
“Oh?” he said. His expression considerably less stern now that we were alone. “How long had you intended to wait?”
“At least a span, sir.” My brush with disaster had left me feeling giddy with relief. I felt an irrepressible grin bubble onto my face.
“At least a span,” he muttered. The Chancellor put his face into his hands and rubbed, then looked up and surprised me with a wry smile. I realized he wasn’t particularly old when his face wasn’t locked in a stern expression. Probably only on the far side of forty. “You don’t look like someone who knows he’s going to be whipped tomorrow,” he observed.
I pushed the thought aside. “I imagine I’ll heal, sir.” He gave me an odd look, it took me a while to recognize it as the one I’d grown accustomed to in the troupe. He opened his mouth to speak, but I jumped on the words before he could say them. “I’m not as young as I look, sir. I know it. I just wish other people knew it, too.”
“I imagine they will before too long.” He gave me a long look before pushing himself up from the table. He held out a hand. “Welcome to the Arcanum.”
I shook his hand solemnly and we parted ways. I worked my way outside and was surprised to see that it was full night. I breathed in a lungful of sweet spring air and felt my grin resurface.
Then someone touched me on the shoulder. I jumped fully two feet into the air and narrowly avoided falling on Simmon in the howling, scratching, biting blur that had been my only method of defense in Tarbean.
He took a step back, startled by the expression on my face.
I tried to slow my pounding heart. “Simmon. I’m sorry. I’m just…try to make a little noise around me. I startle easily.”
“Me too,” he murmured shakily, wiping a hand across his forehead. “I can’t really blame you, though. Riding the horns will do that to the best of us. How did things go?”
“I’m to be whipped and admitted to the Arcanum.”
He looked at me curiously, trying to see if I was making a joke. “I’m sorry? Congratulations?” He made a shy smile at me. “Do I buy you a bandage or a beer?”
I smiled back. “Both.”
By the time I got back to the fourth floor of the Mews, rumor of my non-expulsion and admission into the Arcanum had spread ahead of me. I was greeted by a smattering of applause from my bunkmates. Hemme was not well loved. Some of my bunkmates offered awed congratulations while Basil made a special point of coming forward to shake my hand.
I had just climbed up to a sitting position on my bunk and was explaining to Basil the difference between a single whip and a six-tail when the third-floor steward came looking for me. He instructed me to pack up my things, explaining that Arcanum students were located in the west wing.
Everything I owned still fit neatly into my travelsack, so it was no great chore. As the steward led me away there was a chorus of good-byes from my fellow first-term students.
The west wing bunks were similar to those I had left behind. It was still rows of narrow beds, but here they weren’t stacked two high. Each bed had a small wardrobe and desk in addition to a trunk. Nothing fancy, but definitely a step up.
The biggest difference was in the attitudes of my bunkmates. There were scowls and glares, though for the most part I was pointedly ignored. It was a chilly reception, especially in light of the welcome I had just received from my non-Arcanum bunkmates.
It was easy to understand why. Most students attend the University for several terms before being admitted into the Arcanum. Everyone here had worked their way up through the ranks the hard way. I hadn’t.
Only about three quarters of the bunks were full. I picked one in the back corner, away from the others. I hung my one extra shirt and my cloak in the wardrobe and put my travelsack in the trunk at the foot of my bed.
I lay down and stared at the ceiling. My bunk lay outside the light of the other student’s candles and sympathy lamps. I was finally a member of the Arcanum, in some ways exactly where I had always wanted to be.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Friend’s Blood
THE NEXT MORNING I woke early, washed up, and grabbed a bite to eat at the Mess. Then, because I had nothing to do before my whipping at noon, I strolled the University aimlessly. I wandered through a few apothecaries and bottle shops, admired the well-kept lawns and gardens.
Eventually I came to rest on a stone bench in a wide courtyard. Too anxious to think of doing anything productive, I simply sat and enjoyed the weather, watching the wind tumble a few scraps of wastepaper along the cobblestones.
It wasn’t too long before Wilem strolled over and sat himself next to me without an invitation. His characteristic Cealdish dark hair and eyes made him seem older than Simmon and me, but he still had the slightly awkward look of a boy who wasn’t quite used to being man-sized yet.
“Nervous?” he asked with the harsh burr a Siaru accent makes.
“Trying not to think about it, actually,” I said.
Wilem grunted. We were both quiet for a minute while we watched the students walk past. A few of them paused in their conversations to point at me.
I quickly grew tired of their attention. “Are you doing anything right now?”
“Sitting,” he said simply. “Breathing.”
“Clev
er. I can see why you’re in the Arcanum. Are you busy for the next hour or so?”
He shrugged and looked at me expectantly.
“Would you show me where Master Arwyl is? He told me to stop by…after.”
“Certainly,” he said, pointing to one of the courtyard’s outlets. “Medica is on the other side of Archives.”
We made our way around the massive windowless block that was the Archives. Wilem pointed. “That is Medica.” It was a large, oddly-shaped building. It looked like a taller, less rambling version of Mains.
“Bigger than I’d thought it would be,” I mused. “All for teaching medicine?”
He shook his head. “They do much business in tending the sick. They never turn anyone away because they can’t pay.”
“Really?” I looked at Medica again, thinking of Master Arwyl. “That’s surprising.”
“You need not pay in advance,” he clarified. “After you recover,” he paused and I heard the clear implication, if you recover, “you settle accounts. If you have no hard coin, you work until your debt is…” He paused. “What is the word for sheyem?” he asked, holding out his hands with the palms up and moving them up and down as if they were the pans of a scale.
“Weighed?” I suggested.
He shook his head. “No. Sheyem.” He stressed the word, and brought his hands even with each other.
“Oh,” I mimicked the gesture. “Balanced.”
He nodded. “You work until your debt is balanced with the Medica. Few leave without settling their debts.”
I gave a grim chuckle. “Not that surprising. What’s the point of running away from an arcanist who has a couple drops of your blood?”
We eventually came to another courtyard. In the center of it was a pennant pole with a stone bench underneath it. I didn’t need to guess who was going to be tied to it in an hour or so. There were about a hundred students milling around, giving things an oddly festive air.
“It’s not usually this big,” Wilem said apologetically. “But a few masters canceled classes.”
“Hemme, I’m guessing, and Brandeur.”
Wilem nodded. “Hemme hauls grudges.” He paused to give emphasis to his understatement. “He’ll be there with his whole coterie.” He pronounced the last word slowly. “Is that the right word? Coterie?”
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