The Black River Chronicles: Level One (Black River Academy Book 1)

by David Tallerman

  Durren felt as though someone had just trickled ice water down the nape of his neck. He had to grit his teeth not to shudder. Just this morning, everything had been fine. He'd been no more than another unexceptional student of the academy. Now here they were and his name was about to be put before the Head Tutor. The entire situation felt dreamy and unreal; he couldn't quite recall the sequence of steps that had brought him to this point, where his worst fear had come true through no apparent fault of his own.

  “Hieronymus,” Dremm called over his shoulder as he turned back towards the entrance, “might I ask that you keep an eye on them? I think we can all agree that they've had enough adventures for one day.”

  Hieronymus chuckled, tapped Pootle on its leathery head. “Oh, I can do that,” he agreed.

  Then Dremm was gone, the door slamming behind him.

  They were all still standing in the lowered area at the centre of the chamber, where they'd materialised. Durren would have preferred to wait somewhere else; his stomach remained in knots at the memory of that disconcerting interval between places. But the only chair was the one Hieronymus occupied, and the step down to the pit was just deep enough to serve as a seat, so Durren made himself comfortable there instead. One by one—first Arein, then Hule and finally Tia—the others followed his example.

  The five of them sat in silence. To Durren's ears, it seemed to have a weight all of its own. Part of him wished that someone would say something; the rest was grateful that no one did. For what, really, was there to be said? Only that they were doomed, and that they'd brought this fate on themselves.

  Still, the silence weighed heavy. Even a cleared throat would have gone some way to mitigating it. Durren wondered if he should be trying to reassure the others—or Arein at least. Maybe if he were to blame everything on Tia and Hule, then Borgnin would go easy on her. Then again, more likely he'd only think that Durren was trying to save his own skin. For Borgnin, of course, had no way of knowing that it was already too late for that.

  Dremm seemed to be gone for an impossibly long time. Outside the slit windows, the day dimmed towards evening. Somewhere a bird sang, and Durren wondered what it thought there was to sound so happy about. At one point, Hieronymus appeared to have fallen asleep, but a minute later he stirred with a sputter and a mumbling of nonsense words.

  Then, without warning, the door opened and Dremm was back. He looked particularly pleased with himself—at least until he saw the four of them sitting. Together they jerked to their feet, and Dremm approached as far as the edge of the pit, the perfect position from which to look down on them all at once.

  “You'll be glad to know,” he said, “that the Head Tutor was profoundly interested to hear the story of your exploits.”

  If a hole had opened in the floor at that moment, Durren had no doubt that he would have hurled himself into the depths. It was the way Dremm had pronounced those words, profoundly interested.

  “Struck by inspiration on the way to his office,” Dremm continued, “I suggested to Head Tutor Borgnin that the four of you should be reduced in level. The Head Tutor explained to me that the Black River Academy has never had a level nought, because there have never in the past been students so execrable as to warrant one. Though he was tempted to invent such a rank just for the four of you, he concluded that doing so would not ultimately justify the embarrassment of becoming a laughingstock amongst our fellow educational establishments.”

  Dremm smiled heartily, as though this was all a joke and he couldn't understand why only he found it amusing. “Unfortunately, this leaves us with limited options.”

  Expulsion, Durren thought, it's going to be expulsion. He knew so in every fibre of his being. They would send him away, and what would happen then? His imagination nearly failed at the enormity of the question, the awfulness of every possible answer. He supposed that they wouldn't escort him every step of the way back to Luntharbour. And there were other academies, weren't there? But, so far as he knew, none with quite such lax entrance procedures.

  What did that leave? What alternatives were there for a would-be ranger with three months of training and a good eye with a bow? Perhaps one or two, if he wasn't overly concerned with being honest; but Durren wasn't convinced that a life of banditry would suit him. Maybe there was a town out there somewhere that would take him on as an apprentice guard, if he was willing to spend the next few years working for crusts and a straw mattress.

  Or—he could go home.

  He could go home, and he'd never be able to leave again. He could go home and surrender to that life he'd thought he'd escaped. And had he really believed, or had a portion of him always known? He'd tried to tell himself he had choices, that circumstances could be changed, given enough bravery and determination and a certain amount of foolhardiness. Hadn't he always suspected the truth? That at sixteen years of age he had no choices at all, and no say in his own destiny; that perhaps it wasn't even a question of age and he would never have either.

  “Fortunately,” Dremm said, breaking in upon Durren's thoughts, “for you if not for the good name of this academy, the Head Tutor is a merciful man, and circumstances have conspired to give you another chance. A member of the faculty has for the first time expressed interest in mentoring a party, and has even gone so far as to say that he'd prefer a challenge—a group suited to quests out of the common.

  “Of course, our Head Tutor did not fail to see how fortuitous the timing of this was, and has volunteered your services. It seems to me that this is the ideal solution for all of us: for you because you might yet live down this disaster, and for me because, when you inevitably fail to do so, it will be no business of mine.”

  Durren wondered if Dremm expected some response; a show of grateful enthusiasm perhaps? He sensed he should be feeling something along those lines, but the emotion hadn't quite arrived yet. Maybe it was just that the news sounded too good to be true, or maybe that Dremm seemed so suspiciously pleased.

  There was no time to worry further, however. For Dremm was already turning back towards the door, with a goodbye wave to Hieronymus, and this time he obviously expected them to follow.

  Dremm led the way through passage after passage. Every one was unfamiliar to Durren, and some gave the impression of having been used only rarely. They were lit by occasional torches or by convoluted wells that let glimmers of evening light probe from above. Dremm escorted them up one flight of stairs, down another, and after a while Durren began to wonder if this wasn't simply a cruel and unusual punishment of his devising. Perhaps, having dragged them through these endless-seeming corridors, Dremm would admit at the last that they were to be expelled after all.

  However, Dremm did finally come to a halt, before a towering portal the likes of which Durren had rarely seen. The door must have been twice his own height, was proportionately broad, and the iron-bound planks from which it was constructed seemed like relics from another age, so warped and blackened was the wood.

  “This will be your last chance,” Dremm declared, “and, as far as I'm concerned, it's one too many. I doubt our paths will cross again, which is a great relief. Still, I wish you luck in your future endeavours.” He smiled, and there was nothing at all pleasant in that smile. “If only because something tells me you're going to need it. Give my regards to Storesmaster Cullglass.”

  Then, to Durren's surprise, Dremm turned and hurried away in the direction from which they'd come, leaving the four of them alone.

  Durren and Hule exchanged glances. When Hule's blank expression yielded no answers, Durren looked to Tia instead. For a moment he thought she seemed as uncertain as he felt. Then she caught herself and, stepping up to the door, rapped hard upon the decrepit timbers.

  There came no response. Seconds ticked by. Durren couldn't hear any sound of footsteps from the far side, but then the door looked sturdy enough to muffle all except the loudest of noises. Surely there should be a bell somewhere, he thought, and he glanced around for a pull cord. But no, there w
as nothing.

  “I've heard of Cullglass,” Arein whispered, from below Durren's left shoulder. “I heard he's a bit…well, you know…”

  Durren didn't know, and in that very instant the heavy portal began to swing open, with a groan of ill-treated hinges. The light in the room beyond was low and treacly compared to the corridor, so that at first all he could see of Cullglass was a silhouette, tall and angular.

  “Come in, do come in,” the shape said. Cullglass's voice was high but rasping, reminding Durren a little of a crow cawing. The storesmaster didn't wait for them, but turned instead and trotted back into the shadows. Seeing no choice, Durren followed, and the others moved with him.

  Cullglass took four long paces and then stopped beside a laden table. Durren could see something of his face now. His features were long, particularly his nose and tapering chin, and his forehead was broad, though pinched towards the hairline. Dark, crinkling eyes glistened from behind narrow glasses, which seemed to perch on the bridge of his nose of their own accord. His beard, the same lank grey as his unruly hair, drooped in a braided cord to the centre of his chest.

  As Durren had been considering Cullglass, so Cullglass had been inspecting the four of them. “Now then,” he stated, “my name is Lyruke Cullglass, and I am keeper of the academy's stores, movable goods and retired armaments.”

  At this, he waved with a slender-fingered hand at the room about them, as though trying to encapsulate its contents in the one gesture. Then, with an outstretched finger of the same hand, he pointed at each of them in turn. “And you are Areinelimus, yes? Areinelimus the wizard. Tia Locke, our representative from the rogues. Hule, the fighter. And Durren, the ranger. Do I have it right?”

  They each mumbled in the affirmative as his finger passed across them.

  “I confess,” Cullglass said, “you're not at all what I'd been led to expect. The way Dremm spoke, I'd imagined you to be all fingers and thumbs, knock-kneed and drooling. Between the five of us, I wonder if this initial setback was more a failing of mentorship than of your own abilities? Even the proudest vessel will go astray if its captain is asleep at the helm.”

  “No, it was all us,” Tia said stonily, in a tone that implied that the word us applied to everyone but her.

  “Oh? Well, then.” Cullglass made a clucking sound with his tongue. “Let us put any failure down to beginner's ill luck then. I'm sure even the greatest of heroes had their early hiccups; why, even Severn Urnsalver himself. There are always things the legends choose to omit, my young friends.”

  If it was reassuring that Cullglass seemed both willing and eager to brush over their disastrous morning, still Durren wasn't certain what to make of the storesmaster. He was beginning to see what Arein had been trying to warn them of out in the passage: Lyruke Cullglass was definitely an odd sort, even by the standards of a place that housed its due share of eccentrics.

  But Durren had had time to look around now, and it was fair to say that Cullglass was far from being the strangest thing in the room.

  The space was profoundly gloomy. There were small windows high up towards the ceiling; however, they were closed with shutters of the same dark wood as the door. The only light came from splayfooted braziers of black wrought iron, and those were set towards the centre of the vast chamber, presumably so as to minimize any risk of a stray spark setting light to something precious.

  For, as Durren was starting to see now that his eyes were adjusting, the room contained no end of precious things. Or so he assumed, at any rate. Certainly not everything here would have met his father's definition of that word. There were no piles of gold and jewels, no obvious finery. But everywhere were objects so inexplicable and outlandish that Durren had no name for half of them, and surely that must make them valuable also.

  There were weapons, of course, of every shape, size, and function. And there were spiked and bladed things he took to be weapons, though he had no idea how they'd be wielded. There were wizard's staves, some crude, some impossibly ornate and elegant. There were hats, gauntlets, scarves and sarongs, boots and garters and snowshoes. A colossal clockwork timepiece mounted upon one wall ticked resoundingly. There were multitudinous glass jars, from some of which glassy-eyed creatures stared back distortedly through the jelly within; others contained only lumps and twirls of gooey red that Durren knew with unpleasant certainty had once been parts of living things. There were bundles of dried herbs, flowers and roots, hung from high shelves. There were a great many books, though only a fraction of those accumulated in the main library. And then there were the objects that Durren could interpret only as shapes, not able even to guess what their functions might be.

  The room was a treasure trove. It was a wonder. Any rich merchant or provincial lord would have drooled with envy. Yet the place was also decidedly peculiar, and the more Durren looked the less comfortable he felt.

  No wonder Cullglass was a little odd.

  The storesmaster had been watching them all this while, perhaps enjoying the expressions of mounting awe upon their faces. Now, however, he cleared his throat and said, “So we've met! An excellent start. And you know that I already have great faith in our future together. As far as I'm concerned, the slate has been wiped clean, and there will be no further mention of today's misadventures. Now I'm sure you're all eager to rest after so taxing an experience.”

  Cullglass led them back to the door, again drew it open, with the aid of a black metal ring large as his head. Once the four of them had shuffled past into the corridor, he said, “I shall send word for you in a few days' time, as soon I've been advised by the powers-that-be of your next quest. In the meantime, I shall expect the very best things from you all.”

  And before any of them could think to respond, the door had slammed shut in their faces.

  The rest of the week felt particularly uneventful after that day.

  Mornings and afternoons were the usual round of exercises and lectures. The former involved mostly sword fighting and archery, with a little knife work and wrestling thrown in. The latter were upon a daunting array of subjects, some of which seemed to only have the barest relation with how Durren had imagined his future career. He appreciated that a ranger needed to be able to fight, that was a given. And though he hadn't fully considered the importance of terrain, of hunting, of weather, he'd come to accept that woodcraft was nearly as valuable as being able to defend himself. But an hour spent on the ideal lining for cloaks stretched his patience almost to its limit, and an even lengthier talk upon the topic of edible grubs nearly broke him. At times he wondered if this wasn't the academy's way of whittling their numbers down to more manageable levels. Certainly it was difficult to imagine anyone actually taking in everything they were taught.

  Durren's monthly appraisal with the head of the ranger class, Eldra Atrepis, happened to fall at the end of that week. He wasn't at all surprised when the meeting didn't go well. Not one of his statistics had been judged as improving, not even his strength. He knew he should just be glad that none of them had been reduced after the rat-kind debacle, but still he found the failure dispiriting. At least Atrepis hadn't said too much upon that subject; she had seemed as eager to get to the end of their conversation as Durren was himself.

  Still, Durren left Atrepis's office full of needling doubts. He was finding it increasingly hard to tell when he was pretending to be an average student and when he actually was being average—or even less than that.

  Of course, if he should ever stop pretending he couldn't shoot straight, his dexterity score would likely double. Yet that was impossible. Suddenly revealing himself as one of the best archers in Black River would be a recipe for disaster. What if he should find himself entered into an inter-academy competition? Or even one of the professional challenges the institution every so often sent its ablest students to? The very thought made him shudder.

  All right then, so not dexterity—but with only a little effort he knew he could raise his charisma or intelligence, and where wo
uld be the harm in that? More to the point, could the result really be worse than being branded a perpetual underachiever?

  So it was that, on the one hand Durren found himself dreading being summoned back to Cullglass's storeroom; on the other, he felt almost eager at times. At least another quest promised a break from all the tedium, tension and self-doubt.

  In the event, it was on the tenth day since their disastrous first excursion that the message came. Durren had been beginning to wonder if Cullglass hadn't simply forgotten about them when the summons finally arrived, delivered by a shuffling lad whom Durren took for a minor employee of the academy, probably a stableboy or some such. His brief, mumbled instruction was to go to Cullglass's stores when the Old Tower's bells rang noon.

  Whether because Cullglass had sent him at the last minute or because the boy had dawdled, that didn't leave Durren much time. Fortunately, he was in a free practise session just then, so at least he didn't have to make excuses for his hurried departure. He'd taken care to memorise the way back to the stores after his last visit, and managed to retrace the route with only a couple of wrong turns. Still, Durren arrived to find the other three already waiting.

  He'd seen nothing of Arein and Tia since their first quest, and had recognised Hule only once, fighting in graceless but energetic fashion in the fighters' temporary arena. Arein gave Durren a small smile that he returned, while the other two barely acknowledged him, Tia especially making an effort to look anywhere else.

  This time, Hule knocked, hammering upon the door as though it had done him some personal insult, and the answer came more quickly. Cullglass appeared pleased to see them. Within the stores, the shutters were partly open, softening the murk with bars of dust-laden light. It was possible now to see into the darker recesses of the shelves, and to discern objects that the shadows had hidden before—though Durren wasn't altogether convinced that was a good thing.

  Cullglass led the way to an area near the centre of the room that seemed to serve as his office, though the space was hardly less cluttered than anywhere else. Upon the three surrounding tables, amid the accumulated bric-a-brac, were a dozen huge ledgers, two of them laid open and webbed with cramped handwriting.