by Alex Kosh
“No way,” Chas growled. “All because of some halfwits? We’ll serve them ourselves. We’ll serve them real good. We’ll see who has the last laugh here!”
I’d never seen Chas so angry before, they must have really hit a sore spot.
We had short break while the hungry students were stuffing their bellies, and I decided to have a nap. A night’s sleep obviously hadn’t been enough to restore my strength, and I still felt like a squeezed lemon.
But the moment I closed my eyes, someone bumped me with their shoulder, then whacked me with a tray, and stepped on my foot ... anyway, I soon realised it was almost impossible to snooze in the kitchen. For want of anything better to do, I joined a group of pupils who were excitedly debating life in the Academy. And of course, the most energetic debater of all was Chas.
“Don’t be idiots,” he said. “There’s a good reason why they’re only training us to fight duels. It means some kind of scrap’s due to blow up some time soon, and they’re going to need every craftsman they can get to fight.”
“That’s right,” one of the guys from the faculty of water agreed. “Our Emperor’s not as strong as he used to be – he doesn’t have an heir, and no one knows who’ll come to power after him. Tabernacle or one of our other neighbours might have decided to take the chance to grab the golden city.”
One of our other neighbours? Hah! We didn’t have any other neighbours ... on this continent. And I didn’t see how we could call anyone on the other continents our neighbours.
“That’s ridiculous,” said a guy from the faculty of air. “No one would risk attacking Lita, because the Academy’s here. One High Craftsman’s worth a thousand Tabernacle troops.”
It was exactly like a council of High Craftsmen. All that was missing were students from the faculty of earth. First-year student offenders discuss the fate of the world – a picture worthy of the brush of a great artist.
“They’re not stupid enough to invade us without some magical back-up. But then they have an Academy of the Craft in Tabernacle too. It’s not as strong as ours ...” Chas laughed, as if he didn’t really believe what he was saying “... but it’s pretty good.”
“That’s right,” said the one of guys from the faculty of water, nodding his head. “And that educational institution of theirs has a strange name, too. It’ll come to me in a moment ... Aha! The Order. The Magical Order.”
“And do they teach the same things there as they teach us?” I asked.
They all turned and gaped at me.
“How would we know that?”
“I don’t know,” I said with a shrug. “I just thought ...”
“Take no notice of him,” said Chas, half-joking. He’s always thinking too much, and always off the subject ...”
They all laughed.
I turned away, offended, and decided to quit the stupid discussion. As if I was interested, anyway ...
But then I got talking to one of the pupils from the faculty of air, and we even swapped a few designs for weaving spells. They hadn’t been taught any fire spells, so he was absolutely delighted by the design for a simple fireball. And I must say the spell that I received in exchange, for an “aerial shield” set me trembling in excitement. In the time we had left I told Lot – that was the young guy’s name – why I was there, and he told me what his “crime” was. It was nothing as serious as what Chas and I had done. All he’d done was to create an “air cooler” in his room – he was feeling hot, you see. And for that he’d been given a whole week of corrective labour. So Chas and I had been lucky – Caiten must have gone easy on us the first time around.
After half an hour, Chas and I went out into the hall to collect the empty plates form all the tables. Just to spite me (why else?), the familiar trio were still sitting in their places at the table with that cursed number thirteen.
“Let’s go together,” Chas whispered to me. “If anything happens, you back me up.”
Meaning what? Just what was he thinking of starting?
I made a grab to stop him. But it was too late. Chas went marching proudly across to the table and started gathering up the plates. I did the same at the next table
“You eat all the leftovers, I suppose?” puny Angel enquired. “Can’t let good food go to waste.”
“Of course,” Chas replied, without interrupting what he was doing. “That’s the same principle we follow when we brew this wonderful soup out of yesterday’s leavings.”
All three of them looked down at their empty soup plates, and their faces instantly acquired a greenish tinge.
“And I hardly need mention the simple fact that everyone in the kitchen considers it his bounden duty to spit in the plates of half-wits like you,” Chas went on.
From the expression on his face as he said this you could almost read how many times he’d spat into each plate. Although, to be quite honest, he couldn’t have spat in their plates, because I’d brought them out, and I hadn’t known until the last moment exactly who I was taking them to. But how could the three of them know that?
Their faces turned completely green.
“I’d advise you ...” Lens said threateningly. That is, he tried to make it sound like a threat, but his voice was actually shaking.
“No, I would have advised you,” Chas interrupted. “But it’s too late now, you’ve eaten it all ... By the way, did anyone come across a rat’s tail? I boiled up a rat out of the goodness of my heart, to put some meat in the soup. Especially for our favourite customers ...”
That was the last straw. All three of them jumped up off their seats and made a dash for the door.
“What stupid fools they are,” Chas giggled. “How did you like my performance?”
“Great,” I said. “I just hope we don’t get in trouble for this.”
“For what?” Chas asked in amazement. “I never laid a finger on them. We just had a nice little chat.”
“Very nice indeed,” I agreed. “But did you ever think that the guys working in the dining hall might really spit in your soup, for instance?”
“Well ...” said Chas, turning serious. “It’s better not to think about that.”
“I wholeheartedly agree with you there,” I said with a nod – and an involuntary shudder.
We only got out of the dining hall just before Shins’s class began. Luckily I hadn’t had a chance to think about what my malicious teacher had in store for me today. Or was it really lucky after all? Maybe I would have been able to think of something ... But who was I kidding? What could I possibly have come up with?
At the door of the Small Hall of Power, I hesitated, feeling uncertain.
“Let’s go,” said Chas, giving me a gentle shove. “We’ll cover you if need be.”
Exactly how was he planning to cover me? I wondered.
The rest of our group was already in the hall. Chas and I pushed our way through to our team.
“Where have you been all this time?” Neville asked. “Shins has already been here, smirking from ear to ear, and announced that we have some special kind of class today. Then he went off to some committee... and meanwhile you’re goofing off somewhere.”
Chas and I exchange knowing glances. One person who certainly couldn’t afford to miss this special lesson was me. In fact, I had a strange feeling it wouldn’t start without me.
“Did you go where I told you to yesterday,” Alice whispered in my ear.
“No,” I whispered back.
“Are you out of your mind?” Alice exclaimed at the top of her voice.
Everyone turned to look at her in surprise.
“What are you all staring at?” Alice growled.
Shins arrived ten minutes late, as usual, but this time he didn’t come on his own. There were two other Craftsmen in red livery with him.
“Well now,” he said as he walked into the hall. “It’s a special day today. Exactly two months after the start of studies we eliminate the superfluous elements.” He glanced emphatically in my dire
ction as he pronounced the last two words.
“Here we go,” Chas whispered.
“Today we will hold a series of duels to discover which of you is the weakest link.”
Strange, I’d heard that somewhere before.
The committee of two Craftsmen sat down at opposite ends of the duelling area on comfortable armchairs that had appeared out of nowhere (as I recall, there had never been any furniture in the hall except for terribly uncomfortable benches).
“Now we will draw lots to decide the pairs for the duels,” Shins announced. “The draw is performed using your numbers in the register.”
Do I really need to tell you that my number in the register was thirteen? I thought not.
After the drawing of lots, the duels began. There was a long wait before my turn came, and I had time to think about the spell design that the lad from the faculty of air had given me (what if I could make it work?), and observe the duels between my classmates.
I won’t bother to tell you how Chas, Alice and Neville won their duels. But let me briefly describe Naive’s fighting style. Anyone who was “lucky” enough to find himself under the energy dome with him had only one hope – that a shield would absorb most of the energy and he wouldn’t catch the full blast himself.
So, how did Naive fight a duel? Very simply. He flung an immense fireball at his opponent or, in an extreme case, two fireballs. It was hopeless trying to dodge them, and there weren’t many pupils (in fact there were none) who would agree to fight our fiery boy voluntarily. But in this case everything was decided by the luck of the draw.
I was rather pleased that Naive’s opponent was Triz. Okay, I won’t pretend – my malicious joy knew absolutely no bounds.
“Planning on losing again?” I jibed.
Triz gave me a dark glance, but refrained from replying.
“My money’s on Naive,” Chas whispered to me.
I never doubted it would be.
The two lads pulled up their hoods. The DED spread out above and around them, and Naive immediately launched his famous fireball (in fact, apart from this one extremely simple spell, he couldn’t really do anything much). Triz had just enough time to put up a shield, cover his face with his hands and ... well, maybe say a prayer.
The fireball went straight through the shield, shrinking to about a quarter of its original size, and struck Triz in the chest. The impact of a fireball that size (still almost two feet across) simply blew him away. As usual, the Monitoring Party of Craftsmen didn’t put up any defences. So what if a pupil might get injured? They’d fix him up in a couple of hours, and afterwards he’d be more careful.
I must admit that Triz was the first one who had managed to defend himself so effectively against Naive’s fireball. The others usually came off much worse. Triz might be a prize dork, but he would probably make a good Craftsman.
The loser was carried off to the emergency treatment station, and I cursed this cruel system of education yet again. What was the point of all these injuries? Surely they could invent something beside heat-proof and water-proof liveries to cut down the traumas? Why couldn’t they put up a little shield?
And Triz was lucky – his face was hardly scorched at all, the fireball hit him in the chest, and he managed to cover his face with his hands. He’d got off with a slight concussion and a couple of broken ribs. He’d be cured in a matter of twenty minutes.
The drawing of lots (which must have been scrupulously fair, of course) paired me with one of the most powerful pupils, after Naive. Power, as you no doubt recall, was not everything. But power plus skill came pretty close. Steel had both of these qualities. And he was a good guy, too, always cheerful, always joking. He was the one who arrived at our first class with his livery in total disarray. Wherever his bald head was to be seen, laughter was never far away. So losing to him wouldn’t feel too bad.
“Good luck,” said Steel, smiling as he shook my hand. “May the best man win.”
How neatly he avoided using the word “strongest” – everyone knew that when it to came to strength absolutely anyone in the faculty was more than match for me. Yes, I definitely liked this guy.
But there was something I still had to do before the start of the duel.
I went up to Shins with the most innocent look I could manage on my face.
“Excuse me, would you mind looking over the calculations for my spell?” I asked, and I handed him the sheets of paper with my calculations for the fiery snake. I wanted him to see them and realise I’d done it all on my own.
I didn’t wait for the fat man to answer, but hurried back to the duelling area.
No sooner had I taken my place and pulled up my hood, than the duelling dome appeared. And a few seconds later Steel launched a fireball at me to test my defences.
In reply, I launched a fiery snake to test his fireball. As I expected, when it met my snake, the fireball exploded. Everyone had remembered Shins’s lesson.
Steel shrugged, as if to say he was sorry, but what could he do?
Now, obviously, he would create that pet hate of mine, the firebird. In theory, I was ready for it. Running round my mind I had a slightly amended version of the energy flows drawn for me in the kitchen by the lad from the faculty of air. But would it work?
I ran through the design for weaving the spell, held my hand out in front of me, palm first, and ... nothing happened. The aerial shield Lot had told me about failed to appear. Obviously I must have messed it up with my changes. I was already preparing to accept defeat, when the firebird ran into an invisible obstacle about three feet in front of me and disappeared.
Well, what can I say? Steel was really pissed. A few seconds later two firebirds came flying at me. I couldn’t repeat the same spell, or work any others – I was simply too weak, completely drained.
So I squeezed my eyes shut, put my hands over my face and prepared for the blow.
But it didn’t come. I waited for a few moments and warily opened my eyes. There weren’t any firebirds flying in my direction, in fact there weren’t any to be seen.
From the amazed expression on Steel’s face, I realised that the shield I had put up was still working.
First he scratched the shaved crown of his head, and then he created three fiery butterflies. It cost me a real effort not to run for cover in the furthest corner – but where would I find a corner in a round dome?
This time I didn’t even bother to put my hands over my face: if the defence field didn’t work and all three butterflies hit me, it wouldn’t save me anyway, and if the field did work, there was no point in covering myself with my hands. So I decided to face the danger with my head held high (that way at least I could cover my eyes with the hood).
To my delight, the three butterflies also disappeared in faint flashes about three feet in front of me. I’d been right to make a few amendments to the spell – the original version probably wouldn’t have stood up to so many impacts.
Steel decided to try something that was certain to break down the shield – he created a fireball about six feet in diameter. Well, I told you that Steel was nearly as powerful as Naive, didn’t I?
I couldn’t resist the challenge – I didn’t want to waste the shield that I had miraculously created (assuming that it was still there) on some fireball that might be big, but which I could easily blow up with my snake.
All these thoughts flashed through my mind in a split second, and five slim snakes went darting away from my fingers almost at the same moment as Steel launched his fireball. Four of the snakes disappeared in my own shield, but the fifth found a way through and made straight for the fireball. When Steel realised the danger he was in if the fireball and the snake met, it was too late for him to put up a shield.
The huge fireball exploded only ten feet away from him. The shock wave threw him back against the dome, and he slowly sank to the floor.
The DED disappeared, and for the second time since I started my studies, the hall greeted me with a stunned silence.
I could guess what was coming next: Shins would explain to everyone how easy it was to destroy my wall – that was what I called my new spell. But at least I knew he couldn’t demonstrate it on me, because I very much doubted that I could repeat what I had just done so soon.
I walked over slowly to my teacher, mentally preparing myself for the worst.
“Not bad at all,” Shins said with a nod, and gave me an approving slap on the shoulder.
I was so surprised, I couldn’t think of anything to say. That wasn’t at all what I had been expecting. And no way did I believe that his sudden benevolence was because he read my calculations.
Steel rapidly recovered (a blast of hot air is nothing compared to a fireball in the chest) and came across to shake my hand.