by Power, P. S.
“Saw him first, so he's mine. Now, you two go away. Shew, shew!”
“Hey! I saw him way before you did. Called firsts and everything.” Petra, who'd been standing near the back of the crowd called out, laughing. She smiled and waved a little at Tor again, so, ducking his head, he waved back. It was literally true; she'd seen him since his first year, normally while chasing him around trying to beat him with a stick.
They all laughed, which baffled the hell out of Tor.
Even Sara and the boy trying to reclaim his clothes chuckled. He knew that telling a royal like the Count to “Shew” wouldn't go over very well in general. Maybe the girl knew the huge man or something? It seemed likely, since they'd begun negotiations as to who got fields for their mothers first.
Tor held up his right hand, and tried to smile, hoping no one would kill him for it.
“Um, I have to get it through testing and then have the instructors go over it to make sure it's safe...” He said, his voice soft and humble. It sounded weak enough that Dorgal laughed at him, which earned another glare from the dark haired girl as a reprimand.
Rolph shook his head and winked at the girl.
“Don't start any trouble with Tor, Dorg. He's probably going to be more important than any of us one day...”
Tor wanted to hide under a rock. Saying that in front of a Count! Worse, a Count that could personally kill him by “accidentally” falling down at the wrong time. Was Rolph trying to get the room to himself? They'd definitely have to talk about this, later. When no one would be around to laugh at him.
Besides, some of the royals had strange powers, direct magics, and about a third of them could go into battle rages at any moment, striking out at anyone near with lethal intent and far greater than normal effect. Super human strength and speed, as well as some other stuff.
Tor had never seen anything like that himself, but Kolb had warned him about it early on in training, just in case trouble started at school. Even most of the royals ran away if they saw it starting to happen in someone else, supposedly. He didn't know if the Count was one of those types, but if he was, saying anything that could challenge him, or set him off by mistake, seemed like a horrible idea. Might as well poke a golden bear, Tor thought. They were about the same size as the Count. Well, twelve feet tall and about a ton for the bear, but close enough in regards to how long it would take for them to kill someone as small as him.
Instead of killing anyone, the Count nodded, and so did the girls and the boy who awkwardly folded his clothes, nearly wadding up one of his shirts instead of doing it right. It made sense, didn't it? If he couldn't wash his own clothing, folding them probably had never come up either. Tor walked over and showed him how to do it quickly, since no one would be paying attention to him anyway, he didn't think.
Apparently that thought was wrong. Everyone waited for him to finish showing the boy what to do, then started asking when he thought the new magic would be ready for sale. Tor had to shrug, wincing a little when he remembered that you really shouldn't say “no” to royalty, but not knowing what else to do. He explained that it could take a while before any of the instructors even looked at, much less tested the field and he probably had to do more with it himself first, to make sure that there were no unintended effects just to get the right people to look at it.
The idea of Dorgal standing there wizened and dry made him almost happy for a second until he remembered that the giant Count stood there as well. The guy seemed OK so far, but that didn't reassure Tor totally. Then again, if the royal wanted him dead, or humiliated, nothing Tor did would stop it. So far so good. He'd stood in the man’s presence for minutes and still had all his limbs attached. Now if he could just escape alive...
Rolph took the basket of clothes and walked off suddenly, not even saying goodbye to the people around them, calling out for Tor to follow with a soft chuckle in his voice. Tor did it without thinking, since the redheaded boy was much savvier about wealthy and important people than he was, coming from the Capital and all. He also knew people at the school. A lot of them. They'd been there the same amount of time, but Rolph always had an easy way about him, laughing and joking with anyone he met, lending an ear if they needed it and generally making everyone into a friend. Even the ones like Dorgal seemed to like him on sight.
It was uncanny. Unnatural. Possibly evil mind powers were involved. Tor went along with it anyway. Maybe he could learn to be like that if he tried? Probably not, but it made sense to pay attention. Learn from those that had the skills. That was what school was all about, right?
They got up the stone steps to the room when Tor remembered the field plate had been left on the table. Duh! Without it he wouldn't be able to prove that the last day and a half hadn't been spent drinking or goofing off. He turned to run back for it, hoping it would still be there, only to find that the others had followed them, the Count holding the piece of wood up, smiling.
“Here you go. You'll need this so that you can finish that testing as soon as possible.” Leaning to one side, looking around Tor at his roommate, the giant pointed at the wooden piece. “Let us know when it's ready? I'd love to have a few for mother before her birthday... She complains that her dresses never seem to truly dry, which they probably don't, what with the twenty layers of cloth she has to wear at social functions.”
Indicating he'd see what he could do, Rolph hit the lock plate and pulled Tor inside without waiting for anyone else to speak, then he shut the door firmly in their faces.
“Don't worry about them. Just turn the device in when you're ready. They've lived this long without an instant clothing drying device, they can last a little longer.”
They folded the clothes in their room, since Tor hadn't gotten a chance before.
He didn't want to complain about Dorgal, because who whined about things like that? But the guy really seemed unpleasant. It was annoying. He mentioned this to Rolph, trying to sound noncommittal, like he'd noticed it, but it didn't bug him.
His friend nodded and took a deep breath.
“It can be hard here, being around the very rich and powerful, nobles and all that, if you're just from a regular family. Dorgal isn't like you. You've earned your spot with talent and skill, no one denies that at all. Not even Dorg. Which is probably what makes him go after you in particular. You make him feel... small. Unimportant.” Rolph waved his hands trying to explain. “His family may have some money, but he can't really compete that way here, half the kids here come from situations better than his that way. So he tries to dress well and act the bully, thinking that people will respect him for it. Sometimes it probably even works, but in the long run it's going to backfire on him. He needs to be making friends now, and a lot of the people he's going after like a bulldog are the very ones he'll need as contacts in ten or twenty years.”
Looking at him over his shoulder, clothing being folded tidily enough, if a little lazily, Rolph continued.
“Like you or Davie there.”
“Davie?”
“Right, the boy you helped with his clothes at the end there? David Derring. Countier. Not first in line for his district as Count maybe, but he comes with powerful connections built in anyway. Any son or daughter of a Count does. The kid's smart too, which face it, not all the nobles are. Not that Dorgal would pick on him, but acting the clown in front of him with you probably won't play well, since you were helpful to him. Especially given that he'll want you to make up one of those drying things for his own mother, Trice and Tovey aren't the only ones here that are going to see the utility of this. In those circles, like Tovey's, you know, high noble ones, novel magic and currying favor with others is... huge really. Getting a new magic like this before anyone else is a major coup.”
Tor looked down and then around as if making sure no one was listening, something he'd learned to do when talking about nobles at his mother's knee. The rest of Two Bends knew to be polite, but his mom always acted as if the royals were out to get her personally
or the like, even though Tor was pretty sure that he'd encountered more of that kind of person than she probably ever imagined, being at school and all. “They seem alright, but with names like that, Trice and Tovey, they could be part of my own family. Why my parents decided we all needed names that started with the letter “T” I don't know. If you ever come to visit, I highly recommend taking notes on the names!”
Rolph grinned.
“Cool. Your village is on the way to the Capital, right? Maybe on next break you could come back with me, and we could stop on the way there? My dad asked to meet you personally you know, and I'm sure that will go double once this dryer thing hits the market. Hey! Do you think you could work something up for food? Like with the clothes? To take water out quickly like that? I know that he'd like that.”
Tor didn't speak, instead he walked over to his desk and sat down, making notes. Fruits and vegetables needed different amounts of water removed for them to last well, but if you took too much out they'd be hard to eat. At least that was the case with air drying... So the process would have to be slower, taking about ten minutes or so. That way the field could be turned on and off in time. Maybe a bottom set point could be established? That way it would never get too dry to eat and the water could be taken out in seconds. They'd have to be done evenly at the end, so the field would have to be of equal strength throughout the whole fruit or vegetable. It could be done. Now, could he use the same field for whole fruit as well as cut and processed? If so that could save a lot of time and allow for saving fruit right in the field. It wouldn't taste as good with the skin on maybe, but if it lasted through winter and didn't rot waiting to go to market, a lot of people would be willing to deal. After all, nearly half of all fruit went bad before it got to the table. Vegetables were as delicate, except the root ones, like potatoes. Those lasted longer all on their own.
After about half an hour and three pages of calculations and notes he looked up to find Rolph staring at him, a grin on his face.
“So...?”
“Oh! Sorry, yes, we can do it. I think I have most of the steps lined out here already. I guess I need to remember to talk. Sorry... It's a good idea. Really great actually. Spoilage in the field and during delivery is devastating. This could cut out a lot of that, maybe even most, if it's done correctly. It will take a lot of copies.”
Tor felt himself being absorbed by the project again and started working. It wasn't his school work, but since he'd missed all his classes that day to work on the dryer, he didn't technically have any. Hopefully if he kept up with his reading and asked what he'd missed the next day he'd be fine in most subjects. The only one that wouldn't take a novel field project that worked as a good excuse would be combat practice.
Then when would he really need that anyway? Sure, someone might try to rob him sometime, or he could get into a fight in a bar... except that he didn't drink, because that muddled the mind too much for anyone that wanted to build fields for a living. So all he had to really do was be careful about being robbed and maybe bullies like Dorgal. But even there, he'd probably be better off not knowing how to fight at all, because if he hit the guy, he'd be in a lot more trouble than if he just took a beating.
Kolb wouldn't let him off easily of course. He'd be lucky to just get some extra running or combat practice as a punishment. Whee. What fun, running even farther than he normally did. Could be worse. Once Kolb had made him practice against all of the instructors one after another without a break. It wasn't even a punishment, just regular practice. He could hardly move for a week after that. One of the instructors, a woman in her forties that he'd only met that once, had kept hitting him on the back of the right arm, no matter what he did. Almost exactly the same place each time too. Just thinking about it now, months later, made his arm ache again. It had been a narrow strip of a bruise that had gone all the way to the bone. She hadn't even hit him that hard either, but it had nearly crippled Tor for a while it hurt so badly.
It had probably just been some kind of test or joke. If a test, he had no doubt that he failed horribly. He'd lived at least. After they'd all finished no one had spoken to him about it and his training got a lot harder than before, with even more running, probably because that, running away, was his personal best form of defense, and he'd proved it to all the other instructors by sucking so hard. Kolb had told him that repeatedly. At least several times a week. That he should run away if attacked. The man was actually decently kind to Tor about not being all that good.
He shook himself after a while and looked at the time piece on the wall, the hands said it neared bed time, so he got himself ready, changing into the loose clothing he wore for sleeping, sturdy stuff in a light tan that his mother had made for him the year before and sent with a merchant headed towards the school in hopes it would reach him. It still fit perfectly, because at seventeen he'd pretty much finished growing. Five-four was going to be about it. She may not make elegant clothing, but it lasted and was warm in the winter.
Climbing into bed he looked at Rolph who still read, and wondered if he should say something. Sometimes the guy liked to stay up late reading. It didn't really bother Tor all that much, used to people moving around when he slept, with all his brothers in the same room all the time. Still, the light made it harder to fall asleep for him. Extra light had cost money growing up, since the Baker family used candles and lamps for it. Magical lights were too costly for home use. They didn't even have them at school for the most part. When he learned to make them himself he was going to send several big batches back to his village, enough for everyone if he could. Fewer candles needed meant more time and money to spend on food for a lot of people there.
Rolph didn't make him wait too long, getting into his own bed and saying good night about ten minutes later. For his part Tor drifted off some time after that, still working on a sigil and field for drying food. Like often happened, he dreamed about the new idea and came up with a few corrections in his sleep. He made sure he wrote it all down when he got up, not waiting at all, not even getting out of bed to do it. There was a pad and pencil next to where he slept just in case. If he did ever get up first, he'd probably forget something, which would waste time, thinking it up again later.
Tor got cleaned up and bathed before breakfast, just grabbing an apple and eating it while he worked on the food drying build idea. It shouldn't be that hard. Not now that he'd done his first build successfully. That one was always the hardest; the instructors had told him so repeatedly. Right now he couldn't see the big deal. It had been a little bit hard and took a long time, sure, but that was building. Of course it took a while. If it was easy, everyone would do their own, right? He could build a template now, probably about twenty or thirty hours of work, then use that to make copies. Provided it worked of course. He could make copies from the clothes drying field he'd made already, as long as everyone signed off on it.
It had to be proven safe first which was only sensible, and should be done on all his builds until he gained enough skill to show that his stuff wasn't so flawed it would just kill people outright. It seemed to be, but better to go over it and prove it first. He'd hate to, say, put out a field that drove all the water from a person's body instantly or something, by mistake. Now if it were on purpose, that could make a decent weapon... If only for Dorgal Sorvee, since he'd likely be the only person in the world stupid enough to hit a sigil not knowing what it would do.
Tor set the idea aside.
After all, Dorgal might not be the only one, there were young children to consider too. Three year olds for instance. It probably wasn't fair, but lumping the nasty young man into that childish category made him feel better for some reason. Tor knew he'd have to work on that, since there would be mean people everywhere, his entire life. Letting them rule his mind wouldn't help at all.
Weapons could be designed later, he decided. The military preferred instant kill magics anyway, rather than something as messy as stripping water from a person. Cutters, explosives and
hemorrhages were all popular right now with that type. Shields too, if they could get them. Especially those. It meant that battles were smaller now than they used to be, since well shielded combatants were almost untouchable by anyone, except through specific and high level means, but those same shields that made everyone else superfluous cost a lot to have made. The school only had three for the sake of letting people practice with them for instance and that was for this place, which housed a lot of rich kids, and even royalty. Most of the military didn't even have shields at all, he'd heard from Kolb.
Tor had never even gotten to see one being used. Rolph had, and said they were interesting, but whatever rotation the instructors used hadn't hit him yet. Torrence shrugged it off. It may never be his turn, he knew. The odds of him going to war were slim to none and really, if he wanted a shield like that he'd have to learn to make it anyway. Maybe he should? Shield makers made a lot of gold, he knew, and in case he didn't come up with anything new that people really wanted, it would be a good fallback.
Between something like that and baking, he should be alright.
First things first, he had to get over to his advisor's office, and show off the new field. Hopefully it would be enough to get him partially off the hook with his field study instructors. It took a lot of work, doing a novel build, but most of them would probably be willing to accept it as being of value. Even if it hadn't worked perfectly most of them would have cut him some slack. It took enough focus that the meditation instructor should accept it as practice, for instance.
As quickly as possible Tor jogged over to Frank's office, hoping to beat him there. Nothing like someone waiting on you to show how dedicated they were, right? Especially this early in the day. His plan worked, at least to the level that Instructor Gear wasn't in his office when Tor got there. He waited outside, small cloth satchel in hand, hoping that it wouldn't take too long, since the morning air was just a little chilly to feel nice. In fact he shivered a little as he waited outside the plain wooden door. There was no door lock, but it might be considered rude to just go in and wait there.