Bayan grinned; the sentiment was very Balanganese. Surely Calder was wrong about this man.
“Now, let us begin at the beginning. And that beginning is an understanding of what life is. Let me instruct you in the beauty of Lifeseeker.”
~~~
Bayan returned to Treinfhir’s cold house every day for an hour of anima training at lunch time, since he could not visit after dark anymore, thanks to the new headmaster’s unnecessarily strict rules. The hex’s Savantism training had been on hold for too long already, but Bayan hadn’t come up with a safe way to train. He’d told his hexmates to share any good ideas they came up with, but Calder didn’t seem to want to discuss it, or anything else. His anger with Bayan was apparent, despite the fact that Bayan was doing exactly as he had demanded.
Bayan hadn’t yet learned any anima spells that might be used to control a bear from afar—any gestures at all, in fact—so he couldn’t prove Calder wrong about Treinfhir being Cormaac’s attacker. A small part of Bayan wondered if Treinfhir wasn’t delaying teaching him the actual motions because they would prove his guilt. The headmaster continued to insist that the attack had been perpetrated by a wild beast, or maybe a pack of them. Calder called that a necessary lie, saying the master knew something else was going on, but he couldn’t announce it yet,as if he had an inside view of the master’s mind. And maybe he did. Even more than hating Calder’s chosen blindness, Bayan hated his own jealousy.
Bayan brought two plates heaping with food to the cold house, tromping through a light fall of snow that had appeared overnight. Between bites, Treinfhir expounded on the theories that drove anima magic. Every day, Bayan learned that something he believed to be true was in fact completely wrong. But Treinfhir’s latest revelation didn’t just affect Bayan’s perception of anima magic. It made him question his entire training.
“What do you mean I can do elemental magic in the cold house? Its entire purpose is to prevent wild magic from getting out of the duelists’ control. I know. I’ve been put in one for that.”
Treinfhir gave him a patient look. “You’re not listening, lad. Unfocused magic is different than focused magic. If I tried tae do focused anima in here, it would fail. This cold house restricts both our magics.”
At least the outlander had finally admitted the cold house restricted anima magic. That answered one of Bayan’s myriad questions. “Why one sort of magic and not another?”
“I canna say. My people doona have that wisdom.”
“But what makes the magic focused or unfocused?”
Treinfhir paused as if considering his next words. “Long ago, our clans first clashed with the Waarden, in a long, drawn-out war. Imperials call it the First Tuathi War. We call it the War of Secrets. During that war, the imperials learned something special about our magics. They used it against us and turned our conquest of the middle lands to dust. We were routed, and we never learned why. Whatever the imperials learned, all those centuries ago, that is what I call focused magic. It made them stronger than we were, stronger even than our own elementalists.”
“You had elemental magic?”
“Long ago. Times have changed. We remember how it hurt us, and we only study anima.”
Bayan mulled that over, then returned to an earlier topic. “Do you know how I can unfocus my magic? How I can do elemental magic here in the cold house?”
“Nae, as I said, I doona know what the imperials did tae change their magic so long ago. I canna tell you how tae undo it. I can only tell you that focusing the magic restricts it as it strengthens it. Unfocusing, well, that lets it exist everywhere. In a cold house on the campus of the Duelist Academy, and in the heart of the empire itself, the Kheerzaal.”
An odd sense of relief came over Bayan. Finally, he had an explanation for the impossible magic he’d witnessed at the emperor’s palace. Treinfhir had used unfocused magic. On the other side of that ducat, however, lay the darker thought that unfocused magic was all the Tuathi used anymore. Should the clans decide to invade the empire again in the future, their magic would work perfectly well, anywhere and everywhere.
Bayan soon departed for his next class, but his head throbbed with questions as he descended the trail down to campus. And the question lurking in the dark behind all of the others was the one that concerned him the most: if the defeated Tuathi enemy knew that elemental magic had secrets, why didn’t his instructors?
Or do they?
~~~
Dusk crept earlier and earlier as autumn strengthened its grip on the empire. Bayan finished another talk with the second wave of newniks, then let Kipri escort him back to his barracks through a crisp night packed with crackling leaves and frosted grass.
“Bayan, something’s coming,” Kipri said. “You need to tell Kiwani before someone else does.” At Bayan’s sharp look of inquiry, the eunuch sighed heavily and continued. “Her blood secret is out. The emperor knows. Worse, his enemies know.”
Shocked to his core, Bayan could only gape. Who told? Who would dare?
Kipri spoke in a quieter tone as a pair of chattering bakers passed. “The emperor has been forced to punish her parents for their deception, but he’s managed to protect them somewhat. The public story will be that they’re somewhere in Aklaa, working on cultural issues. A slower pace, health reasons, you get the idea. The emperor will let them retire to their Wisnuk Bay estate in a year or two, and they and their story will hopefully fade from people’s minds. But in the meantime, it’s going to be ugly. The nobles who oppose the emperor already know the true story. Sints know who told them. All the emperor’s current civic and political efforts are in danger of stalling out. Including his newnik waves here on campus.”
“Is… is there anything Philo can do?” Bayan stuttered.
“He’s working on it. He says the empire’s rippling with something big. If Kiwani’s secret is part of it, he’ll tell me.”
Rippling. Like the watery empire map at the Telling. Ay, Bhattara! That’s just a coincidence, right? Tellings aren’t real! He tried to recall Seer Maas’s ramblings. Something about danger to the empire, chaos and loss. That could mean anything—
Without warning, the bright oval of a singer’s portal opened in midair in front of him.
Kipri jumped and yelped in surprise, but Bayan quickly hushed him. Tala sat on her bed, atop a bright quilt, on the other side of the portal.
“Ay, Bhattara,” Tala lamented. “I’d hoped you would be indoors at this hour.”
Pleased to see Doc Theo’s young friend again despite the whirling in his mind, Bayan replied, “Give me a little while to get to the barracks. It’s a little cold out here for conversation.”
The young singer nodded and grasped the two crystals resting precariously on her bed’s footboard. The portal winked out.
“What in sints was that?” Kipri asked, eyes wide.
Bayan hesitated. “Just a friend from the Temple of Ten Thousand Harmonies. She’s a singer. She’s keeping an eye on Doc Theo for me.”
Kipri merely nodded, as if Bayan the hero were entitled to all kinds of fascinating magical friends. Bayan thanked him for his timely warning regarding Kiwani’s secret, then bade him good night and thumped up the steps to the second floor of the barracks. The ruckus of nearly two score teenaged boys laughing, arguing, and banging around echoed from the common room.
He didn’t want to have Calder and Eward for distractions when he spoke with Tala, though—worrying about Kiwani was bad enough—so he headed up to the Hexmagic floor and found an empty room. He performed a small Flamecast to light the room, then sat on a dusty blanket on the edge of one of the beds.
Tala’s portal soon returned. Her expression looked worried, and she wasted no time in getting to the point. “Can I ask you about Doc Theo?”
“Anything you like.”
“I wondered if you could tell me how he was acting before he left your campus. I mean right before he left. I don’t want to trouble him by asking, but… he’s doing strange th
ings… ”
Bayan’s stomach flipped. He’d hoped that Doc Theo had improved completely at the Temple. He’d been imagining him lounging around, telling his favorite stories to all the students there the way he had done at the Academy. “It wasn’t pretty, Tala. He was completely confused. Angry, too. Ranting things that didn’t make any sense.” Bayan paused, bracing himself for bad news. “Is it bad again?”
“No, nothing like that.” She sounded relieved. She took a moment to sing a note into each of her balanced crystals, then continued. “He’s just acting suspicious. He lurks around corners. He won’t talk about certain things in public. I think, looking back, that he’s always been that way; he’s always taken me for long walks into the mountains or the valley to tutor me. We never stay on campus.”
“Do the teachers there treat him well?”
“Some treat him well enough, but… well, he’s a chanter. All the chanters are toenail mud around here.” She paused, and Bayan smiled at the familiar Balang phrase. “Others, though, they look at him as if he personally wrung their puppy’s neck. They seem to be the ones he’s lurking around, though, so they could just be annoyed at him for that.”
“Do those teachers have anything in common with each other, or with Doc Theo?” Bayan felt the desperation behind his hope for a reasonable explanation.
“As far as I can tell, they’re all choralists in the Octet.”
“What’s that?”
“First Singer de Vosen’s coterie of advisors. They help her make the policies for the Temple and all the singers. Who benefits from our skills, which students graduate to which outposts. Things like that.”
“Outposts? I thought there was only one Temple.”
Tala refreshed her crystals again. It looked odd, but fascinating, to see a magic other than duelism at work. Bayan wondered if he’d feel the same amazement if he ever got to see Treinfhir perform anima magic. “There is,” Tala replied, “but some of our singers make certain crafts that bring in money to support the Temple. Sung wine is a big attraction in the provincial capitals and the Kheerzaal. Musical instruments are more tuneful when they’re made from specially sung wood. And so on.”
“Sounds like you could earn a lot of income from those outposts.”
“There’s enough, barely. We just don’t have a lot of singers. Song magic is rare, far rarer than yours. First Singer de Vosen has been making encouraging speeches for the last season, talking to us about new horizons opening up. I’m not sure what she’s going to do, but it sounds as if she means to change the Temple’s traditions. And I’m all for that.” Tala’s voice picked up speed as she warmed to her topic. “We’re cooped up here, keeping our magic to ourselves. If we wandered the empire like the chanters do, we could do heaps of good things.”
Bayan grinned at her enthusiasm. “I wager you could, Tala.” Inspiration struck. “Say, speaking of good things, what do you think about helping me out with something?”
Tala leaned forward, interested. “What is it? Something for Doc Theo?”
“No, for a student here. One of his hexmates was hurt and had to leave. But another hexmate got assigned to a duel den in Aeolis, and it would probably do him good to hear from her. Do you think you can find her for me?”
“Yes, I can. But not while I’m portaling to you. Give me her name, and I can find her and have her give me a message for your friend.”
“Her name is Aleida Bogaard. My friend’s name here is Taban.”
“I’ll portal back to you tomorrow night if I’ve reached her.”
“Thank you. It’ll mean a lot to Taban to hear from a friend right now. I see a lot of Doc Theo’s spirit in you. You couldn’t ask for a better friend. Just… please, watch over him. And contact me again if anything happens.”
“I will. Thank you.” Tala moved to put her hands on the crystals and collapse the portal, but then she asked, “How’s your hex friend? The shy one.”
A bubble of incredulous laughter burst from Bayan’s mouth. “Calder? Shy? He’s nothing of the sort. He’s a loudmouthed, narrow-minded fool who looks before he leaps and lands at all sorts of ridiculous conclusions.”
Tala’s mouth made an o of surprise. “I… see. Could you give him my greetings anyway?”
Bayan flushed. He hadn’t meant to rail against Calder like that in front of Tala. “I will. He’s not so bad when he makes sense, you know.”
Tala’s portal shrank and blinked out, and Bayan stumped down the stairs to his room. When he opened the door, Calder called from his tipped-back chair at his desk. “And what sort of time d’you call this, aye? Where’ve you been, you great slacker? We have an essay due in the morning, and I’d every intention of copying your discussion points.”
Eward looked down at Bayan from his top bunk, where he lounged in a pair of smallclothes and fed Kah some raisins. “Don’t mind him. I offered to let him copy mine, but he turned up his nose at it.”
“I canna read your scratchings, Eward, you know that,” Calder said. “So, how about it? A little hexwork, and we’ll have two essays done in no time.”
“Sure.” Bayan shuffled to his desk.
“Where were you anyway? I thought your newnik thrashings ended eons ago.”
Bayan hesitated, feeling stubborn. Tala had asked after Calder. But she was his friend first, wasn’t she? A friendly face from home. Someone else who Calder would start to insult and suspect, if Bayan gave him long enough. Which he had no intention of doing. Besides, he had a far larger issue to discuss with his hexmates. “I was talking to Kipri. We have a problem.”
~~~
Bayan tapped Calder’s arm as they readied for breakfast. “I’ve got something to show you. Wait a moment.”
Calder huffed an impatient breath as Eward headed into the hallway. “What?”
A small part of Bayan cringed at the callous apathy in his friend’s voice. They had been so close last spring. What happened? Why was his best mate being such an arserag? He hadn’t even shown much concern over Kiwani’s secret being revealed, or the trouble it would inevitably cause her.
Bayan raised his arms and performed the first motions of the Lifeseeker spell. “I wanted to show you our uphill friend’s moves. I’ve learned enough of the motions now to know that he wasn’t casting anything when Cormaac was attacked.”
“What in sints—? Stop that.” Calder slapped Bayan’s arms down. “Are you totally mad, waving anima around like that? Have you forgotten where you’re standing?”
Bayan shoved Calder’s hands back. “You’re the one who demanded I figure out what anima looks like!”
“Aye, but I dinna mean for you to show me in our room with the bloody door open!”
“Fine! I’ll show you later.”
“It’s probably not safe to toss that nonsense about, no matter where we are. You know the penalties.”
“I do, yes. Why do I feel as if I’m the only one risking anything here? You won’t take his word for it, so I have to go learn illegal magic. Now you don’t want to see my proof. Are you even going to take my word for it that he’s innocent?”
Calder’s blue eyes smoldered, and he didn’t answer.
“Fine hexmate you’re turning out to be.” Bayan brushed past Calder and out into the hallway. His stomach wrestled with his breakfast, setting a bitter tone for the day.
Kiwani’s subdued acceptance of her inevitable fate didn’t help, either. In the hex house after classes, she huddled in her chair and stared at the fire. “It had to happen eventually. If not now, then when I took my first duel den assignment. The den chanter would have to know.”
Bayan leaned forward and shot an exasperated look at Eward, who shrugged apologetically. Neither Calder nor Tarin had shown up that evening. Bayan couldn’t spare any worry for their Dunfarroghan antics. “That’s not the point, Kiwani. The emperor seems to be handling his end as best he can. We can’t help him. But we can help you. Is there anything you want us to do or say?”
“Sints, no. Don’
t turn into market criers for my sake. For all my anger at my noble parents, I kept the secret just as they did, and for mostly the same reasons. I deserve what I get.”
“No,” Eward said. “I don’t think you will. The nobles here will be cruel. All your oldest friends on campus will be pretty incensed. They can’t take it out on your parents, so they’ll take it out on you.”
“Then let them!” Kiwani uncurled and thrust her shoulders forward, eyes blazing. “If that’s what makes them happy, then may the sints bless their efforts! I don’t have room in my life right now for something that only used to be important to me. I have bigger issues to fill my mind, such as, oh, who kidnapped me, why I can’t remember any of it, and how I’m going to manage to pass my Avatar test when my Savantism isn’t complete!”
Bayan nodded, but he saw tears in the corners of Kiwani’s eyes. She left soon after, claiming homework.
Bayan expected to hear from Tala that evening, and even took a trip back up to the Hexmagic floor to await her portal, but it never came. Three days passed before she contacted him again.
“I’m so sorry, Bayan.” The worry around her eyes seemed edged with fear, making her look even younger.
Bayan was forcibly reminded of his little sisters, Diwata and Lailani, and his stomach clenched. “What’s wrong?”
“I think something may be wrong with Aleida. But I’m not sure. I tried to find out as much as I could for you—”
“What’s going on?” Bayan leaned toward the portal. “Is she hurt?”
“I-I can’t tell. I tried opening a portal to her location, the way I do when I portal to you. But all I could see was blackness. I’ve tried dozens of times, Bayan, but I keep getting the same thing. It—it scares me. There’s no sound, no smell, just blackness.”
Bayan leapt to his feet.
Tala reached toward him to stall his next action and nearly jostled one of her crystals off the foot of her bed. “Wait, before you do anything, please. It could be my spell that isn’t working, or it could even be some kind of magical block. I don’t know very much about portal songs, or much about trio spells at all.” She lowered her voice. “I’m not technically supposed to be doing them.”
Traitor Savant (Second Seal of the Duelists) Page 16