Tessili Academy (9 page)

Jey looked up when the orderly came in. It
was evening. She and Elle and Kae were enjoying their few hours of
solitude before bed time. The three of them had hardly spoken since
dinner.

Jey could see the fatigue in her friends’
faces. She could feel it in herself. It was exhausting, the
charade. More than anything, she feared waking each morning to find
one of them gone again, her memory erased by the drug they had to
avoid inhaling. Every morning, Jey woke with the fear she’d
forgotten something.

And that, perhaps was the hardest thing of
all. Jey thought what she knew now was the truth. But what if it
wasn’t? What if the things she thought were just another version of
reality, crafted and placed in her mind for some reason she could
not fathom? What if she’d been a different person the day before,
or the week before? What if all her memories were false?

There was no use in worrying about such a
thing, of course. She had to believe in what she thought she knew,
or she would go mad. Still, it was impossible not to wonder.
Although Jey now knew more than she had a week ago, there was an
awful lot about her situation she did not understand.

The orderly moved through the door, pushing
it open with his back and stepping into the room. Jey looked up,
noticing with some surprise he was carrying three slim vases, each
filled with a delicate floral arrangement. He carried them tucked
up against his narrow chest.

Jey resisted the urge to rise and help him.
She recognized this orderly. It was the one she’d first recognized
outside the dining hall, who’d later pushed himself between her and
Nylan when the handler had barged into the senior’s dorm. She
looked at him now. He was not a young man, and yet he looked
nothing like Nylan. Where Nylan had a bristling beard, this man had
only smooth cheeks. Where Nylan was all rough hands and square
shoulders, this man was soft and slight.

Jey didn’t understand, but she felt a quiet
affection for this orderly. He was familiar to her, as if she’d
once known him well.
He was yours, long ago. Back when you were
still a little girl, and you had your own orderly, all to yourself.
His name is Brint.

The thought swirled through her mind like
smoke. Jey strained to remember more, but it was useless. Even
without the drugs her memory was fragmented, vague, and incomplete.
Her clearest recollections were of the opportunities she’d been
sent on. Which were the things she least wanted to remember.

The orderly crossed the room to set the
three vases on the low table. The glass bottoms clicked as they met
solid wood. The orderly straightened, smiled, and looked at Jey.
She regarded him with what she hoped was a vacant stare. “These are
for you to bring with you in the morning. Tomorrow.” He said the
words in a casual tone. As he spoke, he began to move about the
room, tidying the few stray items that were out of place.

Elle and Kae were watching the man too, now.
“Tomorrow?” Kae said. Her voice was bland and distant.

“Yes.” The orderly set an empty tea cup back
on the rack near the door. It would be removed in the night for
cleaning. “For your graduation. The three of you must have
distinguished yourselves tremendously. It’s been ten years since
the last senior graduated early. And then, it was only one.”

Jey felt as if her heart stopped beating. In
their poses of fake occupation, Kae and Elle went still. It was all
Jey could do not to turn and stare at the orderly, to ask him
questions, to beg for his help. Tomorrow? They were to graduate
tomorrow?

Above them, the flashnode went off.

All three girls took the opportunity to go
stiff, to let their eyes unfocus, to blink and go slack.

The orderly, watching them, sighed. His
voice was different when he spoke next – hollow, somehow. “Not that
my warning will do you any good.”

He turned as if to go.

Jey was visited by a sudden memory. It was
as clear and bright as the sunset outside the window. In the memory
she was a child, running across the quad. She tripped on her skirts
and fell onto the stone path. She sat up, palms stinging, and
examined the raw red scape on her knee. She began to cry.

Orderly Brint came to her. He snugged her
into his soft arms. He kissed her forehead. He took her to the
washroom and dabbed a warm, damp cloth on her knee.

Jey made a decision on the spur of the
moment. It was a twofold risk, and it was not her life alone she
gambled with. But it seemed their only hope.

She turned and spoke. “Brint.”

The orderly froze at the sound of his name.
He turned, eyes wide with disbelief. She could see Elle and Kae
struggling not to react, to retain their passive, blank appearance.
Jey continued. “Does Liam know?”

Brint blinked several times, looking
confused. “The professor?” he said.

Beginning to fear she’d made a mistake, she
let her head drift to the side, to contemplate the middle distance.
She said, tone vague, “He’s always been my favorite.”

The door shut behind Orderly Brint. Outside,
the sound of his departing footsteps faded. The three girls sat,
listening, until the sound was gone.

Three heartbeats after all was still, Kae
turned on Jey. “Have you lost your mind?” Kae’s eye were bright
with anger. Her words came in a furious hiss.

Jey looked away, shrugging. Orderly Brint
had not seemed to take her comment very seriously. He’d looked at
her a moment longer, then given a little shake of his head and
said, “I see.”

With that, he’d left. Now, Jey felt cold and
sick with disappointment. She’d been convinced he’d come
deliberately to warn them, that he would try to find a way to help.
Belatedly, Jey remembered the words Orderly Brint himself had
spoken outside the dining hall that day a week or two before.
One of these girls is a thousand times more valuable than you
are. Get one of them rattled and I promise you they’ll have removed
you by morning.

Elle was in her usual spot on the couch. Her
tessila sat in her hand, curled in the cup of her palm. “What are
we going to do?” Her voice carried the same tired helpless weight
Jey felt in her bones.

“We’re going to break out.” Kae stalked
towards the door as she spoke. “At least, I am. If you two don’t
want to try, that’s fine. But I’m not going to sit around staring
at the wall like an idiot, waiting for my own execution.”

Elle, agitated, sat up. “Not this instant,
Kae. It’s too dangerous. And keep your voice down.”

Kae was halfway to the door now, her face
fierce. “What do you mean it’s too dangerous?” She snapped the
words with withering impatience. “What’s wrong with you two? Don’t
you see? We’re trained assassins. We have magic. They can’t fight
us.”

Jey stood as well, taking a step towards
Kae. Her heart was pumping with alarm but she tried to keep her
voice gentle. “And what about the wall, Kae? How do you plan to get
past that? Even if we murder everyone in this place, we can’t
leave. We’ll have two dozen little girls to care for. We might all
starve before we find a way to disable a shieldstone.”

Kae frowned, bristling with anger and
impatience. “Well what do you propose, then, if you’re so
smart?”

Before Jey could answer, they heard
footsteps outside. Kae’s eyes widened. She hurried back to her
easel. Jey sat back down on the couch and tried to compose her
expression as her heart leapt with sudden, piercing hope. Was it
Professor Liam, perhaps? Coming to lead them out?

The door swung open and an orderly walked
in. Jey recognized him with surprise. It was the young, muscular
orderly Brint had been speaking to by the dining hall. She’d seen
him around the quad since then, but she didn’t recall him ever
coming into their room.

He stopped inside the room. “Come on,
girls,” he said as his eyes raked over them. There was something
unpleasant in his gaze. “Bed time.”

Jey tried not to let her confusion show. It
was too early for bed, and something about his tone made the hair
on her arms prickle. She forced herself to stand, smooth her dress,
and move quietly towards her dressing screen. The orderly followed.
He helped her with her buttons. His hands were quick and rough, his
breathing audible. Jey felt a sense of relief as he walked off to
help Elle.

Jey was into her night dress by the time the
orderly stepped behind Kae’s screen. She heard him say something,
heard Kae respond. Her sense of relief vanishing, Jey stepped out
from behind her screen to look across the room.

What she saw made her go still. She couldn’t
see Kae, because she was behind her screen. But the discarded pool
of her white dress lay on the floor. The orderly was also partially
behind the screen. As she watched, he dropped Kae’s night dress to
the floor, also.

“Get in bed.” The orderly’s voice was low
and gruff. When Kae hesitated, the orderly repeated his command,
giving her bare shoulder a little shove.

With one hopeless, confused look at Jey, Kae
complied. Her naked skin was luminous and pale in the wan light.
The orderly stopped her as she tried to pull up her light summer
quilt. He stood over her, a cruel little smile dancing on his lips.
“Just because they’ve unmanned me doesn’t mean I can’t still get
the job done.” His voice was a hard sneer now. “You won’t remember
in the morning, anyway, and you’ll be dead before anyone has a
chance of figuring it out.” The orderly unbuckled his belt and let
it fall to the floor.

Jey stood in stunned silence, a vague sense
of terror beginning to snake through her veins. She had no idea
what the orderly was talking about but she felt an intense need to
defend her friend.

Jey took a step forward. The orderly glanced
over his shoulder, looking first at Jey, then Elle, who also stood
in her night dress, looking on with quiet worry. “You two stay
back,” he said. “Or I’ll make this harder on your friend than it
has to be.”

He flung open his robe, turned around and
lowered himself down on top of Kae.

For one stunned instant, all three girls
were still. Then, Kae exploded. She gave a short shriek of rage
that was no less terrifying for being quiet. There was a quick
scramble on the bed – limbs tangling, hands groping. Jey had taken
two more steps forward when there was a grunt, a flash of blue
light, and a crunch.

For a second, all was quiet. Then, with a
little snarl, Kae heaved the orderly’s body off of her. It fell to
the floor with a slack thud.

Jey stared down in silent horror. She could
tell by the angle of the man’s head that his neck was broken.

“Kae.” Elle’s voice was a horrified whisper.
“You killed him.”

Kae left her bed. She stood, naked, over the
dead man. She looked down at his bare chest and body, face
contorted into a mask of anger. “He was going to …” She trailed off
without finishing her sentence then kicked the dead man in the ribs
with her bare foot.

Elle averted her eyes, turning her imploring
gaze on Jey. “We have to figure out how to hide him.” She said this
as if Jey possessed the miraculous talent of making dead bodies
disappear.

Jey glanced around the dorm. There was
nowhere to conceal a body. The room was open, the entrances to the
alcoves wide and unobstructed. There were no nooks or crannies, no
concealed spaces. The best they’d be able to do would be to drag
him behind a changing screen and hope no one thought to come
looking for him here.

“I don’t know about you two,” Kae said,
picking up the night dress the orderly had dropped and shrugging
into it, “but I’m leaving.”

Jey felt as if this was all happening too
quickly. Her mind felt numb with confusion and anxiety. She
couldn’t tear her eyes from the blank look of surprise in the dead
man’s eyes.

“You can’t, Kae,” Elle said. “They’ll catch
you before you’re halfway to the wall. And even if they don’t, you
can’t get your tessila past the spell.”

Kae gave a derisive snort. She picked up one
of her slippers, stared down at it critically for a moment, then
tossed it aside. Her tessila was a streak of agitated green,
zipping around her head in fast loops. “I’ll cast a passive echo
spell to hide myself. I’ll figure out the rest out as I go.” She
began to walk, barefoot towards the door.

Jey, stirred to action, moved to block her
friend’s departure. “How long can you hold a passive echo spell of
that size, Kae? Because I can only manage mine for five minutes
easily, ten at most.”

Kae stopped, scowling. Elle spoke from
behind them. “Me too,” she said. “Maybe eight minutes if I’m fresh.
Then I need a rest.”’

Kae said nothing. She’d stopped walking, but
her face was a mask of anger.

“Ten minutes,” Jey repeated. “That’s how
much time we’ll have once we leave this room. We need a plan,
Kae.”

Something in Kae’s face crumbled. Her
nostrils flared. Jey realized her friend was fighting back tears.
Kae glanced over her shoulder at the dead man on the floor. She
shuddered. “If we don’t try something, he’s right. We’ll be dead by
this time tomorrow.”

Elle strode forward, her body language
decisive. She walked to the orderly. With a couple stabs of magic
and a swipe of her arm, she ripped a square of fabric out of his
robe. She strode to one of the brillbane bushes that stood in a pot
by the window. With a few deft movements, she broke all the ripened
husks free of their stems, set them in the center of the square of
fabric, and tied the edges together to form a tidy bundle. “We’ll
hide,” she said. “We’ll find somewhere no one will think to look.
We’ll take turns with passive echo spells whenever anyone comes
near. Then we’ll wait, and we’ll watch until we figure out a way to
get past the wall.”