There were six examinations for Laron to complete: two verbal, two written, and two practical. Being seven hundred years old and something of a part-time scholar meant that he had gathered an immense background education, and now this all came to his aid. Theory of Etheric Energies was his best, for which he was awarded a credit. Practical Applications of the Ether was no problem, either, as Laron had been doing castings when Madame Yvendel’s great-great-grandmother had been a laundress in North Scalticar. In the verbal examination for Comparative Anatomy, Laron had been failing until they reached the topic of Dacostian physiology. He began to improvise, once he realized the hooded academician knew less than he did. Wisely, the academician decided to recruit a second examiner. Unwisely, he chose the only Dacostian on the academy staff. Nurse Pellien was provided with a hood and shown in to the examination room. She proceeded to give Laron honors for a dissertation that was based partly on his one night with her, but mainly pure fiction. That was enough for the barest of passes to be awarded in the subject, but only a pass was required.
For the Law and Ethics paper, Laron constructed a system of government called “democracy,” based on a fictitious people he called the Greeks. He was awarded a pass because this examiner, Yvendel herself, was taken by surprise at the sophistication of the scheme. The fact that the Greeks and their system of government had actually existed in some unimaginably distant place was not something Yvendel needed to know, not that she would have believed it anyway.
The final verbal test involved the historical use of etheric sorcery. Some of the examples Laron quoted were so obscure that the examiner did not even know they had taken place, yet Laron spoke with convincing authority. Not wishing to make a fool of himself, the examiner averaged out Laron’s other results and awarded him a pass.
The sixth component of Madame Yvendel’s grading process involved the use of ether in defense and attack. This was not to build up skills or subtle moves, so much as to test students’ ability to channel raw power in ever-increasing quantities. Normally Laron would not have been given such a test until his second year.
He arrived at the lip of the arena, already stripped to the waist, and stood watching the Academy nurse examine his opponent, the Valestran, Arenkel. She signed him off as fit for combat, then turned. Pellien, Laron’s mind shrieked. She held her face blank. He began to tremble all over. Her touch was cool and professional this time, although as she examined his eyes she whispered, “Good fortune, virgin.” She signed him off, commenting only that he was inclined to be nervous when she spoke to Yvendel.
The arena was an ancient cistern with a sand floor. The arched vaults had been removed and seating installed around the rim, and the whole scene was lit by olive-oil lamps. There was no door. Laron and his opponent climbed down to the Sands of Challenge via a ladder, which was then withdrawn. By the rules of such contests, any participant who could not climb out unaided was declared the loser automatically. If both could climb out, the contest was decided on points awarded by a panel of judges.
Laron was wearing the red sash of a student under inquiry, while his Acreman opponent wore the white sash of the Academy. Arenkel was a student of two years’ training, and looked about eighteen. He was also a friend of Starrakin’s.
“We are gathered in judgment of the red challenger,” said Yvendel, without getting up from her seat. “In judgment of his skills, power, and bearing.”
Arenkel bowed to her. “In the name of the Academy of Applied Castings and as the Academy shall I fight.”
By now it was clear to Laron that this was no test, so much as a trial. He would be subjected to considerable pain if he lost, and this would be in punishment for what he had done to Starrakin—who sat watching at Yvendel’s right hand. Laron bowed to Yvendel, then glanced to where Pellien sat.
“Academicians, I dedicate this test to the honor of my friend, with whom I did nothing shameful. I pledge to uphold her honor as I fight.”
There was complete silence. Pellien did not react at all.
“This is not a tournament, Laron,” warned Yvendel.
“I trust not, Learned Rector,” he replied.
It was, in fact, a tournament, it was just that nobody was supposed to say so. Yvendel stood up and tugged the scarf from her neck, then released it. The wisp of cloth floated slowly down. The Acreman watched, while breathing ether into his hands. Laron did likewise, except that he did not watch the scarf. He was watching his opponent.
The moment the scarf touched the sands Arenkel turned and lashed a filament at Laron’s legs, but Laron jumped to let it whip harmlessly past. The Acreman reeled in the filament, formed it into a tangled ball, and flung it at Laron’s head. Laron took the force on his own ball of ether, but spin-dodged to let the attack bounce from the circular brick wall and return. Arenkel snared it with a thin tendril of red, then formed it into a blade that extended a yard from his hand, and advanced on Laron.
Laron backed away, trailing his own ether weapon down his right arm in a blue shimmer. His opponent chopped down. Laron blocked. Arenkel stabbed. Laron deflected. Arenkel seized his own wrist and swung his projection blade. Laron ducked. Arenkel spun, Laron snared his leg with a thin cord of ether, and the Acreman fell, striking his head against the curved brick wall.
“I respectfully request my esteemed opponent to stand,” said Laron.
Arenkel did not move.
“One fall to red,” an examiner decreed.
By now Pellien and Lavenci were sitting forward on their seats, eyes wide. Starrakin had his fist over his mouth and was looking uneasy. Yvendel was stroking her chin and nodding.
A medicar descended to the sands, but it was a quarter hour before the Arenkel was declared fit to fight again. Laron won the next three bouts by forcing his groggy opponent to his knees, but slowly Arenkel recovered as Laron tired. Laron took five falls in a row, but won a sixth as the Acreman became overconfident.
The bouts became less elegant and more frantic. Laron faced the white-belted Acreman student through a thundercloud of blue sparks and tendrils. Both were sweating and straining, trailing tendrils from their lips and fingers, while four examiners sat peering down and a fifth paced about the rim. A timekeeper looked down from a gallery in the wall. The sand about their feet was scuffed and chaotic from the struggle of the past hour and their trousers were soaked with sweat. Blood dribbled down Laron’s chin from where he had bitten his lip. Arenkel broke past Laron’s defense and grasped his hand in a mesh of force, but Laron twisted his whole body and raised his hand, forcing the Acreman around until he could bend his arm backward over his shoulder. Arenkel shrieked with pain, Laron prepared to force him down—then he released him and stepped away. He could smell that the Acreman had lost control of his bladder.
“I request a suspension,” said Laron.
“Red requests a suspension,” said the chief examiner. “Does white agree?”
“White agrees,” panted the Acreman.
The ladder was lowered, and Arenkel climbed out with pee dripping from his trousers. Laron stood with his arms folded, unmoving. Presently the Acreman returned.
“Last bout, prepare to cast,” warned the timekeeper.
Laron relaxed a trifle, bending his knees. His opponent’s cloud surged forward eagerly, as if alive. Laron sidestepped, and the opposing castings slid across each other. As Arenkel stumbled forward to regain his balance Laron dropped to the sand and swept his leg out, and although his opponent’s protective proximity-casting singed his boot, trouser leg, and skin, it was enough to make Arenkel stumble. Laron immediately grappled with his blue cloud of tendrils and hauled the Acreman in an arc with his own tangled casting. Propelled by his own momentum the youth could not stop, and although he flung himself to the sand in desperation it did not save him from sliding into the wall. Two examiners held up white flags.
“Break!” barked the timekeeper as the sands in the glass ran out.
The blue clouds of force-tendrils retreated back to the li
ps and fingertips of their initiates as the examiners gathered and conferred. The chief examiner called results to a scribe sitting in the gallery beside the timekeeper.
“Red has a tied contact over white. Red made a feint. Red sacrificed contact and used cold force to gain advantage. Red won within a single gradation of the nominated time. Red had superior cold balance. White had superior word power. Red had superior word control.”
Yvendel stood up and gestured to the ladder. “The bouts are over, lower the ladder.”
Both contestants were able to climb out of the arena, and they walked into a nearby auditorium behind the judges and academicians, but at the head of the other students. The judges called for Laron’s opponent first.
“White, your petition?” asked the chief examiner.
“Fight with pure word power, did I. Forced red to knees, ah, eleven times. Collected forfeit. Declared ascendant, white should be.”
Now all eyes were upon Laron.
“Red, your petition?”
“I assessed my opponent, giving ground to learn his weaknesses. I forced him to the ground five times, forced one touch, and won the first bout by a drop. I also proved my endurance by winning the last bout. I assessed that his word control grew careless and his attitude overconfident as he collected falls. I used that to advantage in the face of otherwise certain defeat. I should be declared ascendant.”
Four of the examiners returned to their seats and the chief looked up to the gallery to address the record.
“The score is eleven falls and one forfeit to white; with five falls, one touch, and an outright drop to red. As casting vote, I assess that white was overeager to score, and in real life would have died in the first bout. Red studied a superior opponent, then used his observations to advantage. I declare for red. Scribe, declare the score.”
“White: eleven falls and one forfeit, and thus fourteen. Red: five falls, one contact, and a drop, and thus fifteen.”
“I declare red to be the winner,” concluded the chief examiner.
There was no cheering or clapping. All five judges and the Acreman initiate bowed to Laron, who then bowed in turn. The judges began to file out of the auditorium while the black Acreman thumped a hand on Laron’s sweat-soaked back.
“Good fight, sir,” he said.
“Ah, thank you.”
“For forfeit, especial thanks.”
“Think nothing of it.”
“Very embarrassing.”
“Do you know what happens next?”
“Sir, not I. You passing four examinations, ah, that most students take five years to passing, prepare for. Some passing not after ten. You defending yourself, can. Very important. Now final stage. Not test, not exam. Ordeal. Ah, learning, just, it is, ah, but virgin only can learning.”
Arenkel bowed hastily, then hurried out. The rector led Laron out to a small chamber, which was furnished with nothing more than a large and comfortable-looking chair, and a padded bench featuring a dozen stout-looking leather straps. A crystal goblet of something murky and blue was brought in by Lavenci.
“Drink,” Yvendel ordered.
Laron drank. The liquid was alcoholic, bitter and cloying, but had a suggestion of peaches about it. Lavenci left with the goblet and tray. The door clicked behind her and was bolted from the outside. “Strip,” said Yvendel.
Laron pulled the drawstring of his sweat-soaked cotton trousers, then removed them. The rector looked his scrawny, naked body up and down, as if it was a piece of secondhand furniture that did not quite meet her expectations.
“Lie there,” said Yvendel, pointing to the bench.
Laron lay down, and she began to strap him to the bench. He began to imagine lurid erotic rituals, where the rector stripped off her robes and mounted his unresisting body. Nothing of the kind took place. She just walked over to the chair and sat down, her chin resting against the tips of her fingers.
“Fly,” Yvendel said cryptically.
The room began to spin unsteadily, but by now Laron had lost touch with his body and could not call out. His mind blanked, except for a single word. Fly. He could feel something, as if he were rushing through warm air, with a blue dome of sky above and a vast circle of sparkling ocean below. The sun was near the zenith. Laron had arms, but his legs were just an ability to twist his body. He glanced to his arms, which were outstretched. Fins. Huge, long fins. He was a finwing. Experimentally he gave a few flaps, dipped, banked, and climbed. He was clumsy, but could manage to stay in the air.
For what seemed like a half hour he flew on. He began to feel unpleasantly warm. Did he need to stay moist? Fly, not swim, yet finwings needed to splash into the water occasionally to keep wet and cool. On the other hand, he was not a finwing. What was he? He flapped higher, leveled out. Laron now noticed that his lung sac was uncomfortable; in fact, it was beginning to feel as if it were burning hot. What was he to do? Fly until he died? He told himself that this was all allegory. The water was some sort of vaginal refuge, while apart from his fins he probably was a phallic sort of shape.
What seemed like an another half hour passed. By now the joints at the base of his fins ached, and he was so hot and dry that even twisting his body was an effort. He dropped closer to the waves. Droplets of spray struck him. He dropped lower, bouncing on the wavetops. This was still flying, he told himself, but his lung sac was still a molten slug of lead within his ribs and his back was as dry as desert sand. Was crashing through the waves still flying? Laron flapped to gain speed, dived, and plunged through the crest of a wave—just as a vast shadow sailed over, clawing at the spray that he had just raised.
In a panic Laron gained height as the giant leatherwing banked and came around. Fly. Being eaten by a giant winged lizard would soon put a stop to that. He stared at it for a moment, mesmerized. There was something alluring, hypnotic about it, yet his fears pushed all this aside. As the leatherwing dived after him he folded his wings back and plunged for the water, then leveled out at the last moment and flew along the trough between two waves. A huge head full of teeth on a serpentine neck shot up at him, closed over him for a moment—then he was flung clear and high into the air as the leatherwing smashed into the sea dragon’s neck.
Battered, bleeding, and with one wing badly torn and buckled, Laron circled the fighting giants as they thrashed spray high into the air. The droplets were cool on his skin, but all too soon the leatherwing vanished beneath the surface. He had to fly on. This is like something in my recent past, a long journey over the sea, he told himself as the sun dried out his battered body again. He could remember few specifics, just burning thirst, agonized longing without end, weakness, no end in sight …
Laron opened his eyes to find Yvendel unfastening the straps. When he tried to sit up, he nearly fell from the bench, and Yvendel had to hold him steady as he eased his weight onto his feet.
“How do you feel?” she asked as he took a few experimental steps.
“Like I’ve never owned a pair of legs in my life, Learned Rector. What was all that about?”
“You were learning a few basics of control. They are techniques specific to my academy, they must be learned unaided, they can not be taught.”
“So, did I learn them?” he asked, casting his mind back to a recent tutorial in seduction with Pellien, as well as earlier, monosexual experiments with his newly living body.
“Only just,” Yvendel said sternly.
“What do you mean?”
“The marginal status of your virginity was clearly visible. Describe what you saw and experienced.”
Laron did so. Yvendel listened impassively until he had finished.
“Well, you were right, the sea was a parallel of sex. The other things were dangers and distractions that virgins ought to be able to avoid. Virgins recognize the allegory with the true path; in this case the leatherwing.”
“What?”
“You heard me. You should have had no fear of celibacy—in the form of the leatherwing—because you
had no experience of being devoured. Non-virgins dive straight for the ocean and show no fear of being devoured by the sea dragon. This directly contradicts the order to fly.”
“I—I don’t follow. I was meant to be eaten?”
“You were meant to be eaten by the right predator, which was the leatherwing. You would nourish the leatherwing’s body, just as when you become a member of a religious or magical order you contribute to the strength of the whole. The greater body keeps your own body flying, whereas if you flew on alone you would be knocked out of the sky by misery and fatigue. You must have come closer to losing your virginity than ingenuity and scholarship has ever been able to devise, yet somehow kept it. The sexually experienced soon plunge into the water to refresh themselves, saying that it is all in the interests of staying fit enough to fly. However, the command is to fly, not to stay capable of flying. Your splashing through the wavetops was flirting with the ocean without really plunging into it. Nobody has ever flown without being eaten until now, but you flew, so you pass. What you will be able to do when next you try to use that skill will be truly interesting, but that is your business—just like whatever you did with whoever you did it with.”
“I see,” said Laron, feeling very uneasy. “So where does that leave me?”
“It leaves you as a non-commissioned sorcerer of the ninth grading level of initiation. Now that you have learned these controls, you can use them for the rest of your life. They cannot be lost.”
“And if I’d not been a virgin?” asked Laron.
“I would have noticed. It is exceedingly obvious.”
“Oh.”
Laron considered this. He had been measured against some unimaginable standard and found satisfactory. He felt a trace of smugness, akin to the time he had set fire to the Academy’s door. Suddenly doubts assailed him again.
Voyage of the Shadowmoon Page 41