A Scholar Without Magic

by Guy Antibes

  “I won’t charge you a thing if you allow me to chat with you while you eat,” the woman said.

  “Fine with me.”

  “Good, then let’s introduce ourselves. My name is Hilsa Forinin, and I own this place. It is the best Zogazin restaurant in Vaarek.”

  “Not just in Tolloy?” Sam asked.

  She shook her head. “Vaarek. I have many customers.”

  Sam looked around at the empty restaurant.

  “You caught me at a lull,” she said. “The university students are still in class, and most of my clientele work for a living, so they won’t arrive until dinnertime.” She plunked salt and pepper on the table. “If you aren’t a Zogazin, you might want some of this.”

  Sam shrugged. He didn’t care, but he did admit that whatever he was eating tasted far better than the Zogazin restaurant in Bliksa, after he had it properly seasoned.

  “I am Sam Smith. I have applied to the University of Tolloy and hope to get in to further my education.”

  “Good for you,” Hilsa said. “What got you all the way to Tolloy from Toraltia?”

  Sam gave her pretty much the same story that he had given Captain Gortak.

  “You are staying with Plantian Plunk, then?”

  Sam looked up. “You speak as if you know him.”

  Hilsa smiled and looked at the ceiling. “I do. Plunk is a friend of one of my best customers, Renatee Dinik, a Zogazin professor at the university.” Her gaze turned to the bowl of lamb stew. “You are already finished!”

  “I am a growing boy, ma’am,” Sam said, pulling out his purse.

  She put her hand on Sam’s wrist. “On me…this time. I have a distinct feeling you will be one of my regular patrons. I have plenty of university students who need something different from dormitory food.” She pointed across the street at an entrance to the university and laughed. “That archway is the south entrance. Use that the next time you want some of my stew. I serve it most nights, and if you liked it raw, like this afternoon, you'd get something even better when you come after a day of studying.”

  Chapter Two

  ~

  A fter a week of intensive coaching from Professor Plunk and, surprisingly, from Desmon, as well, Sam entered the university to sit for entrance examinations. There were twenty students, by Sam’s count, congregated at the bottom of a lecture well with fifty or more desks. He was relieved that Captain Gortak had passed him, but as Desmon pointed out, he could still be under some kind of surveillance. It didn’t bother Sam because he wasn’t going to do anything that would bother Viktar Kreb’s activities. He decided that there was nothing he could do to affect the dictator’s continued exercise of power, so a few years at the University of Tolloy would be a good finishing touch to his education.

  The examination consisted of answering five different banks of tests. Each bank had a different mix of questions, and the answers had to be handwritten. Sam was relieved Banna had finally relented and taught him Vaarekian cursive.

  The test was about to begin when Ziggor Smallbug huffed into the room, followed by his students. Glory and Tera spotted him and waved excitedly.

  “Restrain yourselves,” Ziggor said. His voice dripped with disapproval, but when he noticed they were waving at Sam, he tilted his nose up in the air.

  The proctor began to protest, but Ziggor produced a document that he waved under the woman’s nose. “This will settle you down,” Smallbug said.

  And it did. The proctor said something, probably uncharitable, under her breath and handed out tests and instructions to Smallbug’s charges. Sam got a surreptitious smile from Tera after Ziggor left the room. Glory looked a little nervous, but she took a deep breath and waited for the final instructions, which the proctor had to repeat to the newly-arrived prospective students.

  “There will be a battery of five tests. Each one will be three-quarters of an hour with a quarter hour rest, repeated four more times.”

  More than a few of the students groaned with the information, but Sam already had a good idea what the tests would be like and the timing. He had eaten a very large breakfast before he walked over to the university, following Plunk’s suggestion.

  The test began. Sam looked around the room and found that the first test wasn’t the same for all the students. Evidently, the proctor didn’t trust the students, so the prospective students couldn’t cheat by looking at the student’s work next to them. It didn’t matter to Sam, who generally worked fast enough that such things only slowed him down.

  The first section was on mechanical science. Being the son of a blacksmith and having traveled around a bit, Sam felt comfortable answering all the questions. He was finished long before the next student and asked the proctor what to do.

  “Sit,” she said, “and don’t bother the other students. You can’t go out and study on the other subjects to gain an advantage over the others.”

  Sam nodded. It seemed reasonable to him, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t review what he what was jammed into his mind. Each test was pretty much the same. Sam took more time with history since he had to adjust from the Toraltian version of Vaarekian history. Desmon had known more about Vaarekian history than Professor Plunk did, except he hoped Desmon’s version was acceptable.

  His last test was on pollen, and Professor Plunk cautioned Sam against putting down answers that wouldn’t be appreciated by the University. If Plantian had answered the questions with Sam’s knowledge, he admitted he might fail the entrance test, since his views on pollen weren’t very conventional. Sam figured he would reduce his exposure by trimming his answers to the bare minimum, and he finished, for the fifth time as well, long before the others.

  The proctor pursed her lips as she accepted Sam’s work.

  “I don’t know how you can be so fast and so right,” she said. “Scores will be posted tomorrow morning outside the doors to this room.”

  Sam left the testing without much worry about his result. Too much of what was on the test was presented during his last year of schooling in Toraltia. He was a little disappointed about the rigor of the University of Tolloy’s curriculum, but then Professor Plunk told him that he shouldn’t have any trouble. Sam wished for more of a challenge. Even the pollen questions were elementary for Sam, but he wouldn’t have done so well without the last year-and-a-half of experiences working with and against pollen.

  Despite his confidence after the testing, Sam still had a mostly sleepless night. Emmy had even complained in her own way, whining a bit when Sam tossed and turned and got up and went back to bed during the night. He didn’t waste any time getting ready for the day and headed back to the university to see his scores.

  There was a bit of a crowd around the posting board in front of the lecture well where he had taken the test. Smallbug’s students clustered around the empty board, waiting for the results. Tera Barako noticed him and stepped out of the crowd.

  “Aren’t you interested in your scores?”

  Sam smiled. “I’m here, aren’t I? I’ll let the others cluster around nothing to look at. When the scores are posted, I’ll be elbowing my way in.” She looked much more nervous than Sam. “How did you do?”

  “I knew the answers, I think. My mastery of Vaarekian isn’t what it should be,” Tera said. “It puts me at a disadvantage. That isn’t the case for you, I am sure. You were always the first to finish.”

  Sam sighed. “A fault, I am sure. I’ve always been a fast test-taker. Glory would confirm that.”

  “She already has. Glory said you were the smartest student in the class.”

  “Fastest, maybe not the smartest.”

  Tera smiled. “I’ll bet you were the fastest and the smartest.”

  Sam didn’t know the right thing to say. Such repartee was above him. He might be a good scholar, but his tongue was definitely a slowpoke. His silence was cut short by a commotion. The proctor muscled her way through the students and pinned the results to the board. From Sam’s position, there was a thick r
ed line a little more than halfway down the page. That meant only about fifteen students made the cut.

  Tera hustled and pushed her way through the students. She came back with a smile on her face. “I passed!”

  Sam waited another minute or two, as students shouted with glee or glowered with disappointment. He started from the bottom and didn’t see his name below the red line, but he looked up and up and found his score at the top of the list.

  He noticed that five of Smallbug’s students were right at the bottom of the acceptable list. It was apparent to him that they were ‘given’ acceptance despite their scores. It didn’t bother him, since he had scored higher than them all. But then he did have an exceptional memory. Out of all the students, Sam was the only one who didn’t rely on pollen all the time. Perhaps that made a difference in how he approached studying. He shrugged.

  Glory punched him in the arm. “Are you conceited?” She pointed to his name.

  “Why should I be?”

  “If it were some other person, I would wonder, but not where you are concerned. You are no different from two years ago,” she said.

  “In some ways,” Sam said. “Not in others. We both have done some growing up, I hope.”

  Tera giggled. “I hope so!” Glory joined her.

  Smallbug bumped into Sam as he approached the posting. “All my little chicks made it,” he said in a self-satisfied way. “And you, Smith?” He looked at the bottom of the page.

  “Top of the chart, Professor Smallbug,” Glory said.

  “Oh. An achievement, to be sure,” Smallbug said with a sarcastic ring to his voice. “Time to go, Wheeler and Barako. School has already started for you, and if we don’t hurry, you will be late for class.” He strode down the hallway.

  Sam drifted towards the lobby to the building and stopped at the registrar. “I passed the entrance examinations. What is next?”

  “Name?”

  “Sam Smith.”

  The man found a file and looked at a duplicate of the scores. “Number one. Good for you, Smith. Wait here.”

  After a quarter-hour, the man returned with a folder. “I put all you need to get started in here. There is another application, but it is much smaller. We will need a two-gold deposit before you can start classes…”

  Sam pulled out his purse. “Here you go.” He put two gold coins on the table.

  The clerk looked at them. “Trakatan, eh? Those will work.” He filled out a receipt and clipped it to one of Sam’s papers. “One for us and one for you. Normally I tell new students to report in a week, but in your case, I wouldn’t wait to get a good room in the first-year dorms. Students will start drifting back from Midsummer Break. We shuffle the rooms each year, so everything is up for grabs.”

  “Can I have a dog in the dorms?”

  The man shook his head. “No pets.” He spoke in a lower voice. “Is it a small dog?”

  Sam smiled. “A Great Sanchian Hound.”

  The man’s eyes blinked. “No way to hide such a beast. You can visit with it and walk it around the grounds, but it can’t stay with you. I’m sorry.”

  “Had to ask. I’ll fill this out and bring it back,” Sam said. He needed to consult with Professor Plunk on what constituted a good dorm room.

  ~

  “Aren’t we going to celebrate?” Desmon said.

  “What do we celebrate, that I got in? I’m more concerned about getting settled and starting my studies,” Sam said. “I didn’t think I’d be going back to school again once I left Cherryton. Antina Mulch suggested that I go to the University of Tolloy, but I thought I would find a place where I could snoop, and that would be that.”

  “You can’t tell me you aren’t anxious about your first year,” Desmon said. “I heard you tossing and turning and Emmy whining all night.

  Sam smiled. “I was anxious. Don’t you want to excel, Desmon?”

  “I have excelled,” the ex-sailor said, “in my own way.”

  “Then give me the same chance. I have to get used to becoming a scholar, rather than an apprentice. University students aren’t sixteen in Baskin, by the way. They generally go to a preparatory school before taking entrance exams.”

  “Neither are most students at the university,” Professor Plunk said. “We also have preparatory schools that administer the entrance examinations. Students are two years more advanced than you, Sam. But since you did so well on your entrance examination, you will have the privilege of choosing your classes and field of study before the others.”

  “As much as I would like to study Pollen Sciences—”

  “Not for you, I’m afraid, at least as it is taught by most professors. I can tutor you from here. I live close enough to the university for that, and I can even use my university office or an unused classroom.” Banna’s father smiled. “I think I can come up with some very interesting topics to discuss. You have a more objective perspective than the others that I generally teach. Since I’ll be doing the tutoring, you can receive credit, but a field of study means taking classes from a multitude of teachers.”

  “How does that work?” Sam asked.

  “You have two fields of study, one is the First choice, and the other is the Second Choice. They are referred to as First and Second at the University. What suits your fancy?” the professor asked.

  “What would help most in snooping?” Sam asked.

  “I would guess Politics, but that might be a little touchy in Tolloy,” Plunk said, nodding his head. “Seeing that the political science department is a breeding ground for Viktar Kreb’s toadies, perhaps History might better suit you. You can learn about various cultures and what has worked and what hasn’t through the years.”

  “That sounds interesting enough. Does it get into geography?”

  “There is no geography subject in Tolloy. History encompasses current and past civilizations. That might not be the case elsewhere, but it is here. What else interests you?”

  Sam thought for a bit. “I like to invent things.”

  “Mechanical Science, then. I have a friend in that department. Renatee can help you around.”

  “Renatee Dinik? The owner of the Zogazin restaurant knows him.”

  “You’ve already met Hilsa?” Plunk said grinning.

  “I have,” Sam said. “I told you I was famished after my interrogation at the Intelligence Agency. I stopped at her restaurant.”

  “Marvelous! Do you like Zogazin food?”

  Sam shrugged.

  Desmon looked at Sam. “It’s too bland for me.”

  “We should go sometime. I’ll bet the owner can spice it up a bit for you. She let me salt and pepper the stew to my heart’s content. It might have been inedible otherwise,” Sam said.

  Plunk smiled. “I agree with that. Unadulterated, Zogazin food tastes like boiled pollen.”

  “You’ve actually had some?” Desmon said with a sparkle in his eyes.

  Plunk raised his hand. “Back to your university strategies, Sam. You’ll need to quickly pick your first-year room. They are all a bit small, but strategically, there are some options. There are three sets of buildings. One is closer to the library, another is next to the central commissary, and the last of the three borders the playing fields and the gymnasium. You can get a feel for the students by what dorms they choose.”

  “Which one is by the mechanical workshops, if that is what you call them?” Sam asked.

  “Oh, I see what you mean,” Plunk said. “History would work for the library, but Mechanical Science would definitely work with the dorms the athletes use. The South Dormitory even has a small commissary nearby. It is a bit harder to find a room, since many athletes are permitted rooms during their entire time at the university. They are also a bit bigger, but not by much.”

  “Then that is my choice. I only have to put up with it for a year, and then I can move out of the university-supplied housing, right?” Sam said.

  Plunk nodded his head.

  “I’ll go over this afte
rnoon.”

  “It is time to get my schedule for after Midsummer Break, so I will walk over with you,” he said. “We can take a tour of your dorm before you make your final choice if you don’t mind having an old man along.”

  They checked in with the administration building. Sam had brought along his file, and Plantian was given two classrooms to look over, while Sam received a list of open rooms in the different first-year dormitories.

  “Let’s get your room out of the way first,” the professor said.

  Their first visit was to the North dormitory, close to the commissary. The rooms were nearly as tight as the small cabins on The Twisted Wind, and the windows overlooked the university stables.

  “If you don’t get sick of the food, you will soon be sick of the smells,” Plantian said. “I think you will like the South Dormitory better.”

  Sam looked at the third of five possibilities open to new students in the South Dormitory and was relieved that it felt like a real room. He noted that he could see the south entrance to the university from the third-floor window looking across from practice fields. The place felt right to him.

  “I like this one,” Sam said to Professor Plunk who sat on the mattress in the room while consulting with his calendar on possible classrooms for his courses.

  “Huh?” The professor finished some scribbling. “This will do. You might want to take up a sport or something to fit in better,” he said.

  “Does swordsmanship count as a sport?”

  “Dueling? It does indeed.” Plantian rose from the bed and pointed out the window to one of the blocky buildings making up the athletic department. “The one with the curved roof is for dueling practice, but I wonder when the government will take that over for training.”

  “Hopefully not this year,” Sam said, a bit more excited about living in the South Dormitory.

  They walked past the two empty classrooms offered to Professor Plunk, with Sam waiting while Plantian took a few more notes in his notebook. He paced off the last one and nodded his head. “Let’s get back to the administration building. You have a room to reserve, and I quite like this classroom.”