Brightly Burning (11 page)

As the next class proceeded, more ideas for escape came to him, for after all, there was still dismissal time to worry about this afternoon, and arrival in the morning.
I can wait as long as I have to for them to leave,
he decided.
And I'll really study, I won't just pretend to.
Although he still didn't care much for his classes, studying was preferable to bullying. And there was one thing that he did like: the reserved approval of his teachers for his progress. Reports were sent to parents at weekly intervals, and Lan's parents had been much better pleased with him of late.

Better not to hope for that. It was enough if Tyron and the others would leave him alone. This ploy might make him late for dinner, but that was no problem. As long as he was safely at school and not running wild with friends (as if he had any), his parents wouldn't care where he was.

At the end of the last class, the third idea came to him, another flash of revelation that answered his final problem.
Sixth Form never gets here much earlier than anyone else.
In fact, he had occasionally gotten in past them because he had arrived before any of them did.
No one at home is going to pay any attention to how
early
I get up.

It would be a sacrifice, because of all things he loved best, one of them was to lie abed in the morning. Getting up early was torture.

But if he could avoid the far worse torture the Sixth Formers meted out, it would be worth it.

I'll ask Cook to send one of the boys to wake me as soon as she starts work,
he decided. That would be a good time; Cook was up and at her duties a good two candlemarks before any of the family. She might not like it, but he could mollify her by not demanding anything for breakfast that she didn't have already done by the time he got downstairs. Yesterday's bread and butter and jam would be good enough for him! She always cooked up more than anyone could eat; he could pocket the leftovers to serve for his lunch. And if his parents wondered why he was going in early and staying late, his weekly reports would be all the answer they needed.

The Sixth Formers would
never
get up early enough to catch him. Abusing the rest was an amusement for them, and things cease to be amusing if you have to make a personal sacrifice in order to attain them.

They're lazy; even if Tyron manages to bully the rest into promising to come early or stay very late, they'll forget to have someone wake them, or they'll get cold and tired of waiting for me.
Tyron himself might stay, but Tyron by himself was just a single large, strong bully. He'd have to catch Lan, and he'd have to do it before Lan reached the street, while Lan was inside the school walls. Lan, on the other hand, had the distinct advantage of a good look-out spot. He could wait until he saw one of the Guard coming toward the school on his regular patrol. If the Guardsman heard a commotion, he'd seek out the source, whether or not it was behind a private wall. A Guardsman wouldn't care who Tyron's father was; he'd see a bigger boy abusing a smaller one, and he'd drag Tyron off and at the least give him an ear-blistering lecture. At
worst
(so far as Tyron would be concerned), he might even haul Tyron in front of a Justice!

I'd like to see Tyron explain himself then!
he thought vengefully. It would be painfully clear just who was bullying whom, given Lan's stature and Tyron's—and that was something that could not be explained away. If Tyron claimed he was administering punishment on the orders of the Schoolmaster, there would be inquiries. A Justice might not take kindly to the notion of the Master of this school permitting the Sixth Form to adjudicate and administer all punishments.

But that was too much to hope for. Quickly, he stifled any rising elation and visions of revenge (or at least justice) at the hands of the Guard.

It would be enough merely to vanish from the minds and memories of the Sixth Form. Let them think his illness still kept him at home.

So when the rest of the class left the classroom, he remained behind, as usual. He took one of the desks in the back of the room, nearest the inside wall, so that if anyone glanced inside they wouldn't see him, just in case one or another of the teachers looked in. There he applied himself to his book with determination, if not enthusiasm, until the light had faded so much that the words danced in front of his eyes.

Only then did he slowly and cautiously rise and make his way to the window, peeking out carefully, to see if anyone was still waiting for stragglers.

The yard was empty; so was the street outside. Already the lamplighters had finished one side of the street and were working their way up the opposite side. It was
very
late; he'd have to run if he didn't want to be too late for supper.

He gathered his books and flew down the stairs and out into the gathering room. For the first time in a very long time, his heart felt as light as his feet.

S
TRETCHING aching muscles, Herald Pol pulled the blue-leather saddle off of Satiran's muscular back and regarded his Companion Satiran with a lifted brow. “Did you have to take that obstacle course
quite
so fast?” he asked the pearly ears tilted back to catch his words.

:You're getting soft,:
Satiran replied, with a complacent swish of his silvery tail.
:All you ever do is stand around classrooms. It's my duty to keep you fit.:

Pol heaved the saddle up onto the rail of Satiran's open stall with a grunt. “If you keep wrenching my shoulders and legs out of their sockets, I'm not likely to agree to run the obstacle course anymore, and then how do you accomplish your so-called duty, eh?”

Satiran turned his head on his long neck and looked straight into Pol's face with his lambent blue eyes, then bared his teeth in a mock snarl.
:I
could
chase you all around the Collegium. I'd not only keep you fit that way, I'd amuse the children.:

“You would do that, wouldn't you?” Pol sighed, removing the blue wool blanket and draping it next to the saddle. “Is that fair?”

:You want them to retire you?:
Satiran countered, shaking his head vigorously.
:You're fifty this month, and your hair is as silver as Herald Vanyel's. If you don't keep proving how fit you are, they'll force you to stay at the Collegium, and you'll die of boredom.:

“Don't you mean
you'll
die of boredom?” Pol asked, but knew better than to wait for an answer. Satiran was never happier than when they were out in the field; the Companion seemed to thrive on bad weather and rough forage. He wasn't even
damp
after that rather enthusiastic round of the obstacle course, and Pol was dripping with sweat. “Why did I ever get Chosen by such a
hearty
soul?” he asked, eyes turned upward so that it seemed he addressed the roof of the Companions' stables.

But it wasn't the roof that answered.

:Because someone had to keep you fit,:
Satiran replied, then produced a whinny that was entirely like a snicker. Lifting his silver hooves precisely, even daintily, he backed out of the stall, then turned and trotted off to Companion's Field where he dropped to the grass and rolled enthusiastically in the sun, just like any common horse.

Pol laughed in spite of aching shoulders and calves, stretched again, and headed for his quarters in the opposite direction, boots ringing solidly on the wooden floor of the stables. He wasn't going to be fit to encounter until after he'd had a bath and a change of clothing.

This had been an ongoing source of teasing and amusement between himself and his stallion since he was Chosen. Pol was, by nature, rather indolent, and freely admitted it. He liked living at the Collegium, and although he didn't
dislike
going on circuit, if he didn't have to, he would much rather be here. He had been born and raised in Haven, and loved his city and everything in it.

If only being a Herald didn't require leaving Haven so often! There's no city like this in the world, I think.
Even now, although the fine, bright days of autumn were past and Haven had taken on the gray cloak of early winter, he still thought it lovely.

He wouldn't have minded being permanently assigned to the Collegium, although truth be told, he wasn't an indispensable teacher. In fact, his main value to the Collegium lay in a rather peculiar fact. Unlike many other Heralds who taught here, aside from very strong Mindspeech, he didn't have a second strong Gift. Instead, he had a very little of
everything.

There wasn't another Herald like him; others might have had many, many minor Gifts, but they weren't like Pol. For him, every single minor Gift, however weak, was active and usable.

As a consequence, although his Gifts were not in and of themselves terribly useful, he could literally teach younglings with any possible Gift or combinations thereof, even the most rare and esoteric. He could fill in until specific teachers could be brought back from other duties to tutor them past the beginning levels. At the moment he was coaxing a youngster with Animal Mindspeech through the first, tentative uses of his ability. Pol had to be in physical contact with an animal to speak to it or understand it; this young Trainee was going to be able to look through the eyes of any creature within leagues when he was ready to go out on circuit.

Before then, one of the two Heralds Gifted with strong Animal Mindspeech would have come back to spend a few moons at the Collegium and give him the benefit of an expert's teaching, but until then, Pol would do. Whenever there was a new trainee with a rare Gift, it was often Pol who was summoned to return to the Collegium once the youngster had settled in and his Gift was identified.

Pol was perfectly happy with any opportunity to help the young Trainees, however much Satiran might fret and long for “adventure.”

“Adventure” is usually synonymous with discomfort, not to say pain,
Pol thought to himself, as he reached the door of the Herald's Wing and opened it.
“Adventure” is never the exhilarating experience that the would-be adventurer thinks it is.

:I heard that,: Satiran snapped.

:You were meant to.:
Pol chuckled at Satiran's mental snort of contempt, and headed for his room to get a fresh set of Whites, the full Herald's constant uniform that identified him as the proxy of the King himself—dispenser, discloser, and adjudicator of the law of Valdemar.

Ah, yes, a
fresh
set of Whites—clean, mended, and ready for him whenever he needed them. That was another benefit of being here, and not on circuit. A packhorse could only carry so much, and he got very tired of wearing the same clothing for days on end.

And that assumed he was on circuit and not pulling messenger duty, which meant riding for days on end, sleeping and eating in the saddle. He'd only had that duty a few times, but it was definitely
not
his favorite.
Thank the gods there are other, much faster riders than I!
he reflected, feeling every one of his years as he walked down the dim, quiet hallway toward the men's bathing room.

He hadn't been the only one out on the obstacle course today; several of the other teachers had taken advantage of the empty course to take some much-needed exercise. The Heralds had to take the times when it wasn't being used by the Trainees, who were, after all, the ones it had been built for. Pol was met at the door of the men's bathing room by a cloud of steam and the greetings of his fellows.

“Good run out there, Pol!” called Herald Isten, invisible in the steam hanging above his bathtub. “You ran that course like a man half your age!”

“And I feel like one who is twice my age,” he replied, with a groan that was only half feigned, stripping off his filthy Whites and dropping them into a laundry hamper. “You haven't used up all the hot water, I hope?”

Isten laughed and fanned away the steam, so that his round, red face crowned with curling tendrils of dripping hair, darkened by the damp, appeared like a disembodied spirit in the mist. “I saved you enough, I promise.”

“That's good, because if my old bones can't have a good soak, I'm going to have to thrash you.” Pol eyed his colleague sternly.

Isten chuckled, knowing the bluff for what it was, and let the fog hide him again as Pol took a free tub and ran water into it from the copper boiler that served this bathing room. He checked the fire beneath the boiler, and added a stick or two of firewood while the tub filled. The boiler's supply of water was topped off from a reservoir on the roof of their wing, the same reservoir that supplied cold water directly.

Pol added some herbs and salts to his bathwater and climbed in with a sigh of utter content as the hot water soothed his aches.