There were only three days left until the section test and the culling that would follow. As Gord had predicted, we were not the only first-years to have heard the rumors. Perhaps they had been deliberately sown, perhaps not. All I knew was that the campus was suddenly a far more somber place. There was no talking or jesting in the meal lines anymore, and conversation at table now consisted of discussing our studies and what might or might not be on any of the examinations.
All of us studied harder, but some of us had our own particular demons to wrestle. Rory’s was Varnian grammar. Natred and Kort worked endlessly on drafting. Mine was Captain Infal’s military history class. He’d spent the last two weeks on sea battles from King Jurew’s War. I failed to see how sea tactics and strategy applied to cavalry officers, and had a hard time keeping the names of the various captains and the military capabilities of their various ships fixed in my head. Now I reread my notes, desperately trying to memorize every stage of each battle. I was furious with the instructor, certain that I’d never use any of this knowledge that I so painfully pounded into my memory.
And Spink struggled with his math. It was awful to watch him. There was a safety lamp that was kept burning in the stairwell at all times, even after lights-out. In the ferocity of his drive to find more hours to study, Spink would furtively creep out on the landing with a chair and stand on top of it to bring his book close enough to the dim lantern to continue studying the equations and how they were manipulated. In the mornings he rose with bloodshot eyes and a sagging face to begin the day.
Spink’s efforts did not escape notice by Trist. He only spoke of it once to him, and he sounded almost kind when he did. “We all see how hard you’re trying, Spink. And we, well, whatever you have to do to get a good score, we’ll know that you’re doing it as much for us as for yourself.”
Spink lifted his head to stare at Trist and said quietly, “I don’t cheat. Not for anyone.” Then he had turned his gaze back to his books. He had not looked up again after that, not even when Trist shoved his chair back from the table and stamped out of the room.
If the culling had been all we had to worry about, that would have been enough. But for Spink and me, there were other concerns. The day after Spink was put on probation, there was no letter from my uncle. I had written to him of Spink’s situation, and posted the letter that same day. The first missed letter worried me, but I persuaded myself that he just needed time to think. The second day with no response conveyed a chill message to me: he blamed me for bringing Spink into his home. What would he write to my father about it? I tried to put a brave face on it for Spink, saying that perhaps his letter to me was delayed, or that he had not yet received mine that explained everything. Spink didn’t believe it any more than I did. It was not reassuring when that evening, just when I most wanted to study for the exams I’d face the next day, I was summoned to the commander’s office.
I hurried across the winter-dimmed campus, dread a cold weight in my belly. It had snowed the night before, but the day had melted the snow to slush. Now it was hardening into uneven ice on the pathways. I slipped several times, trying to hurry. When I finally reached the stone steps of the administration building, I forced myself to ascend them carefully. My uncle’s carriage and man awaited outside the building. Anticipation warred with dread as I went up the steps. At least, I would soon know where I stood.
Caulder admitted me and walked me silently to the door of his father’s office. He met my gaze with a smirk I hated. I did not thank him for opening the door for me. I did notice that when it closed it did not latch behind me. I walked forward, saluted, and then waited, ever mindful that Caulder’s ear was most likely pressed to the door crack.
Colonel Stiet sat behind his desk. My Uncle Sefert sat in a comfortable chair to one side of it, looking anything but comfortable. Colonel Stiet spoke to me. “Your uncle is concerned that you have not written to him lately. Have you anything to say for yourself, Cadet Burvelle?” Clearly Colonel Stiet regarded this as a trivial and annoying complaint. I could almost hear him thinking of his home and lady waiting for him. I kept my eyes on him as I replied.
“I have written and posted letters to my uncle daily, sir. I, too, have been concerned that he has not written to me for several days.”
I saw my uncle sit up straighter in his chair, but he did not speak. Colonel Stiet pursed his lips. “Well. It seems to me that we then have the answer to our little puzzle. Something has interrupted the post. Letters have gone missing. Certainly this should not cause any of us much distress, however. I do not feel it has been worth this ‘emergency’ meeting tonight at the end of a long and arduous day.”
I could not think of a reply, but my uncle answered for us.
“Ordinarily, it would not,” my uncle replied. “Save that I have had some concerns about young Nevare of late. And thus I made him promise to write to me daily. When he appeared to be ignoring that request, I naturally felt concern.”
“Naturally,” Colonel Stiet agreed, but his voice was flat with skepticism. “And now that you are reassured that all is well with him, I trust we can put this incident behind us.”
“Certainly,” my uncle agreed. “So long as Nevare continues to write to me daily. I shall have one of my men deliver my messages and pick up his to me, to be sure that the post does not fail us again. I have promised my brother, Nevare’s father, that I would watch over him as closely as I would my own soldier son. I intend to keep that promise.”
“As a man of honor, certainly you must.” The words were correct, but there was still that odd flatness to his voice. The colonel looked at me as if he’d just realized I was there. “Dismissed, Cadet. Lord Burvelle, would you care to join me at my home for a glass of wine before you depart?”
I had already turned to go when my uncle spoke. “Actually, Colonel, I fear I should be getting back to the city. Things are a bit unsettled at my home of late. I shall walk Nevare back to his dormitory, I think, before I leave.”
The colonel was silent for a few moments. Then, “The walks are icy tonight, Lord Burvelle. I strongly recommend against this.”
“Thank you for your concern, Colonel Stiet.”
And my uncle left it there, neither saying he would take the colonel’s advice nor that he would ignore it. It left the colonel little more to say except “good night.” And that he did, and my uncle returned it to him. Then he joined me as I opened the door for him. As I had suspected, Caulder was lingering in the foyer. I walked immediately to the outer door, but my uncle greeted him kindly and asked him how he had been of late. Caulder responded with faultless courtesy and a smiling familiarity with my uncle that roused an unreasoning fury in me. I suppose I felt as if Caulder were somehow claiming my uncle. I deliberately held the door open for my uncle, admitting the cold wind into Colonel Stiet’s foyer while they chatted. When my uncle finally bid Caulder good night and preceded me out the door, I was glad to let it close on the building and all it contained.
I think my uncle sensed my upset, for he followed me carefully down the icy steps and then paused to wrap his scarf more closely around his neck. “My wife’s family has close ties with Lord Stiet. That is how we know his brother, Colonel Stiet, and Caulder of course. They have been guests in my home.” He paused as if to let me reply, but I could think of nothing to say. “The wind has a bite in it tonight,” he observed. “Shall we sit in my carriage and talk for a bit?”
“I should like that, sir,” I said, but then added, “If you do not think it would be too hard on your coachman.”
He cocked his head at me. “A good point, young Nevare. You show your father’s concern for folk of lesser station. It is what made him such an excellent officer, and so beloved of his troops. Gaser!” He raised his voice to call to the man. “I’m going to walk Nevare back to his dormitory. If you get too chilled, you may sit inside the carriage.”
“Thanky, sir,” the man replied, gratitude in his voice. As we walked away, I felt warmed, not just by my uncle’s praise, but that he had acted on my concern for his coachman. My uncle took my arm as we walked.
“Well, Nevare, if you had to guess, where do you think our letters have gone astray?”
“I’m sure I’ve no idea, sir.”
“Oh, lad, you don’t need to dissemble with me. I suspect that if I went to my wife’s little writing desk and broke the silly lock on it, I’d find them all neatly stacked there. I don’t think even Daraleen would have the gall to destroy them completely. No doubt she will say it was an oversight of some sort. It would not be the first time she had tampered in my affairs.” He sighed. “So. Why don’t we cut to the heart of it, and you tell me what you think made her do it.”
His calm acceptance of his wife’s fault should have made it easier for me to speak. Instead, it only seemed harder. I suddenly wished that I had been forthright with him from the beginning, and told him not only about the séances but also that Epiny was writing to Spink. To tell it now made me feel I had been a party to his daughter’s deception, as indeed I had. He listened in silence as I told the tale, passing lightly over Epiny’s efforts at being a medium and dwelling charitably on how impressed Spink had been with her. My uncle lifted his brow in surprise when I told him that Spink’s mother and elder brother would surely write to him any day now to ask permission for Spink to court Epiny. It was only surprising that he had not already received their letter.
“Perhaps I did,” he said when I paused. “Perhaps it is in my wife’s secretary, with our correspondence. Perhaps it is what triggered this whole incident. Let me be blunt with you, Nevare. My wife has lofty ambitions for Epiny. Marrying the soldier son of a new noble and living hundreds of miles away from Old Thares and the court is not what she has in mind for her elder daughter. She takes Epiny into situations that I think ill advised, to try to advance her socially. This séance nonsense, for instance…if only the girl were not so childish. Other girls her age are already young women, formally presented to the court and already spoken for. But Epiny…” He sighed and shook his head. In the darkness, I caught his rueful smile. “Well, you have seen how she is still a little girl in all the important ways. I tell myself that in her own good time, she will grow up. Some flowers bloom later than others and some say their fragrance is sweetest. We shall see. I have forbidden Daraleen from rushing Epiny into womanhood. Childhood is too brief and precious a thing to waste.” He cleared his throat. “I thought that my lady wife had come round to my way of thinking when she suggested that Epiny be sent off for some time with other girls her age. Epiny objected, with one of her harangues about being trained to be an ornament for a rich man’s mansion.” He glanced at me and his smile was small and a bit bitter. “I suppose I should have guessed that she was already imagining herself dominating a poor officer’s quarters instead.”
I walked on with him, arm in arm, and my tongue felt thick with ashes. Epiny deceived her father, and by my silence I contributed to it. Yet what was I to say? That when she was alone with Spink and me, she behaved not only as a young woman, but also as something of a coquette? I kept my silence and my guilt.
“So I can see how your friend’s infatuation with her and his prompting of his family to seek permission to court would have been upsetting to Lady Burvelle. She has not even had a time to display her precious treasure at court, and some new noble upstart is trying to claim her and carry her off to a life on the wild frontier!” My uncle almost made a joke of it. He sounded amused, but regretful that it had happened.
I took a breath and plunged in. “Spink is very taken with my cousin, Uncle. That is true. But he has not written to her. The correspondence has been one-sided. It is true that he asked his mother and brother to speak for him, but surely that is what any honorable man would do; first, to attempt to secure permission before he began any courtship of the girl.”
I thought I had carefully led him up to seeing the truth of it: that Epiny only pretended to be childish. But he would not drink of that idea. Instead, he said, “Well, at least my little girl has had her first childish infatuation. Surely I can take that as a sign of her growing up. And she chose a handsome soldier lad in a bright uniform with shiny buttons. I suppose I should have expected it. But I had no sisters, you know. Your father and I and our two younger brothers were like a den of bear cubs growing up. My mother despaired of ever teaching us anything about young women and how they should be treated. Epiny and Purissa are delightful but mysterious to me. They play at dolls and tea parties…it is an enchanting thing to watch, but how, I ask you, can that consume hours of their time? But doubtless you think me indulgent. I suspect your own father takes a firmer line with his offspring.”
“He does, sir, in some ways. And in others, he is indulgent. Once when Elisi asked him to bring her back blue hair ribbons from his trip to the city, he brought her, not two, but twenty, in every shade of blue the millinery had offered him. I do not think it a fault for fathers to dote on their daughters.”
We had drawn near to my dormitory. We halted on the walk. The tips of my ears and my nose stung with cold, but I sensed my uncle had not said all he wished to say.
“Let me change the subject, Nevare. Your letters were very detailed, and I assure you that your keen observation of how cadets are treated here will benefit those who follow you. But bring me up to date on yourself. How have you fared over the last week?”
“Oh, it has been nothing out of the usual, I suppose. The last few days have been a bit frantic. We’ve heard there is to be a culling, not by student but by patrol, based on our upcoming exams. It has all of us a bit worried, for there is not a cadet here who does not have a weakness of some kind. A failure by any of us could bring all of us down.”
“A what? A culling? Explain this to me, please.”
And so I did, as best I could, adding several times that it was only a rumor, but one spread by Caulder himself. My uncle’s expression only grew darker as I explained it to him. At last he spoke. “I myself think this is a useless and destructive way to ‘cull’ weak cadets from the ranks. That the good and solid should perish with the lazy and the weak simply because of how your rooms were initially assigned seems but random cruelty to me! I know two members of the Academy board. I will use what authority I have to persuade them to look into this. As I have no soldier son in attendance, they may wonder why I take such an interest. Worse, I fear they may see that I am trying to advance the cause of the battle lords’ sons over their own soldier sons. At the best of times, the board does not move swiftly. Any action they take may be too late to save you this time. All you can do is study, pray, and, of course, encourage your fellows to do the same. At least you’ve a holiday to look forward to when exams are done. You’ll have a few days of leisure over the Dark Evening observances. Shall I come and fetch you to my house for them?”
I squirmed a bit. I enjoyed visiting my uncle, but I’d been looking forward to an opportunity to see Old Thares in holiday guise with my fellows. After a moment I admitted that to my uncle, who laughed genially and said, “Of course! How could I be so forgetful of what it is like to be a young man? Enjoy your time, then, but be cautious as well. Pickpockets and worse will be out and about on Dark Evening.”
I hesitated, dared myself, and then blurted out, “Is it true, what the lads have been telling me about women and Dark Evening?”
That made him burst out with a ringing laugh that turned the head of the night watchman on his early round. A blush warmed my wind-chilled face. I was certain my schoolmates had played a prank on me. When my uncle could speak, he replied heartily, “It’s true and it’s untrue, as most holiday traditions are. At one time, generations ago, the Long Night had several pagan rituals attached to it, and women who served the old gods as priestesses were said to seek out the favor of any man they wished. There was some old legend…what was it? That on that night of the year, they were the goddesses incarnate and thus not bound by the rules that bind mortals from day to day. We all serve the good god now, and a day does not pass that I do not thank him that we are freed from ritual sacrifice and scar oaths and sacrificial floggings. Those were bad days, and if you go far enough back in our family history and read the soldiers’ logs, you will see that even then, the common men regarded those practices as a burden and a scourge. Some, however, will make out those to be ‘the good old days,’ and speak of freedom and the power of the old gods. I think they are fools. Licentiousness and drunkenness and whoring and public floggings were the order of the day. But I’m lecturing you, when all you want is a simple answer.”
I nodded, mute.
He smiled at me. “It’s mostly a joke now, lad. Sometimes a ribald jest between man and wife. She may disappear for that evening, to try to prick her husband with jealousy. Or sometimes a man’s wife will come to him, masked and mysterious, on that night, as a way to bring back a bit of the romance to a marriage become commonplace. It is a night for masks and pretense and wild whims. People take to the street costumed as the kings and queens of old, or as heroes from the old myths or as the nightshades who served the old gods. But do respectable women actually wander about and offer themselves like common whores? Of course not! Oh, one or two perhaps might tempt themselves with that fantasy, but I am sure it is a rarity. Any women you encounter on that night will be professional, and I very much doubt they will offer their services for free!” He laughed again, and then, growing suddenly sober, asked me hastily, “You have been warned, have you not, that whores may carry vermin and disease?”
I quickly assured him that I had, and had received many lurid and stern lectures on that topic. On that note, he bid me good night. He had turned away and started off down the path before I gave into an impulse and ran after him. I called to him and he halted to wait for me. “Uncle. About Spink. Will you…do you feel he deserves to be on probation for receiving letters from Epiny? After all, there was little he could do to prevent that from happening.”
He grew suddenly more somber. “It is unfair in some ways, Nevare. I know that. To be absolutely correct, he should have returned her letters, unopened, to me. To have read them and to have them about the barracks, well, it exposes her reputation to dispute. I’m a bit surprised that he would accept such tokens of affection from a mere child. But it does speak well of his intentions that he asked his brother to approach me.” He paused a moment, considering the matter.
“I will do this for you. I will get our letters, yours and mine, from Daraleen. And I will, if they are there, get the letters from your friend’s mother and brother. The very least I owe young Lord Kester is a response to his request that his soldier brother be allowed to court my daughter. But I will also demand to see what sort of missives Epiny has been sending to young Spink, to incite such a battle frenzy in Daraleen. I should have sensed there was something behind her sudden demand that Epiny be sent off to a finishing school. And Mistress Pintor’s Finishing Conservatory at that! It is very expensive, despite its remote location. And I shall sit down with Epiny as well, to explain to her the courtesies that are proper between a girl and a young man, for I’m sure she has no concept of what she has done. Doubtless she thought to befriend him and no more than that. If all is as I expect it is, I myself will contact Colonel Stiet, to see that Spink is restored to his good standing at the Academy. Does that put your mind at ease?”
I scarcely could say yes, for I feared what he might find in Epiny’s letter to Spink. I had not yet known my cousin to mince words, even when she was trying to persuade her father that she was far too young to be considered a young lady. But I kept that thought to myself and only thanked my uncle and shook his hand. Before he released my hand from his, he added, “If Epiny were of a suitable age, I might even look favorably upon a suitor of Spink’s quality. He seems a level-headed young man, and that is a trait I think my Epiny will sorely need in a husband.” But even as my spirits rose with hope, he added, “But he would not fit at all with my lady’s political ambitions, I fear. I doubt she would ever assent to Epiny becoming engaged to any new noble’s son.”
I was incredulous. “My aunt has political ambitions? I do not understand.” How could a woman hope to compete in the harsh world of nobles and influence? “I thought she would seek a wealthy suitor for Epiny, or someone of a fine old family—”
I think my uncle sensed the whole of my question for he shook his head at me. “And you think that is social rather than political? You have much to learn, Nevare. Or would, if you were a first son. Soldier sons are blessedly immune to such machinations. Here in Old Thares and especially at court, the wives of lords have a society of their own, with a hierarchy of power and alliances that seem far more complicated to me than the simple politics of the Council of Lords chamber. Epiny and Purissa are the coin my lady will spend to secure her position, if you wish to put it crassly. With them, she will buy alliances with other noble houses. There have already been inquiries about both my daughters. I have made it plain that I choose to wait until they are women before I decide. I would have them marry well, but also to men whom I can trust to protect them, and even to men they may grow to love. Colonel Stiet has made no secret that he would take either of my girls as a match for Caulder. But Lady Burvelle hopes to find first sons for both of them, and as determined is she is, I suspect she will succeed.”
“But—” I began, but my uncle held up a hand.
“It’s too cold out here to discuss anything more tonight, Nevare. I have kept you far longer than I intended, and you’ve given me much that I need to think over. You should be getting to bed. If I’m not mistaken, it will soon be lights-out in the halls. Clear your mind of your worries for now, or rather, think only on preparing for your exams, for that is the only thing you can really do anything about. Write to me, and rest assured that if I do not hear from you on a daily basis, I’ll be back.”
And with that he was gone, stamping his feet to warm them as he took the path back to his carriage. I became aware that my own toes had gone numb. I hurried up the steps of Carneston House and reported to Sergeant Rufet on the desk, for I was returning to the dormitory a bit late. He excused me when he heard I’d had a family visitor, and I hurried up the dimly lit stairs. At the final landing, I found Spink perched on his chair, holding his math text to the wall sconce. He looked ten years older than he had at the start of the year.
“My uncle summoned me,” I said without preamble. “He came to the Academy because he hadn’t been receiving my letters.”
“Does he despise me?” Spink asked immediately.
I told him all that had transpired. I spared him nothing, thinking it was better to let him know that he had small chance of ever winning my cousin. He nodded at my account, and a ghost of hope came into his face when I told him that my uncle might speak for him to the colonel. But then it slipped away as he confided, “Her letters to me are very affectionate. I doubt he will read them and think she would write such things if I had never encouraged her. But I swear that is the truth, Nevare.”
“I believe you,” I said. “But I also fear the same things that you do. That he will think that you incited Epiny.”
“Well. There’s nothing I can do about that,” he said. His words were philosophical but his voice was despairing.
“You should go to bed, Spink. Get one solid night of sleep this week. This endless studying will make you a wraith by week’s end.”
“I just need to keep at it. I just need to fix the equations in my mind. Where I cannot master it by understanding, plain rote may suffice.”
I stood a moment longer. “Well. I’m going to bed.”
“Good night.” He was not to be dissuaded from his vigil.
In the darkened study room, my books were on the table as I’d left them. I gathered them up in the dark and carried them back to my room.
I put them away by touch and undressed by my bed, letting my clothes drop to the floor. I was suddenly too tired to deal with them. I listened to my friends’ breathing for a moment, then fell into my bed and let go of consciousness.
The remaining days to the section exams both lagged and sped past me. I thought it cruel that Captain Infal did no review with us, but simply kept on introducing new material right up to the day of the test. I felt my brain was crammed with dates and facts and names, but little understanding of how the battles had flowed or what the overall strategy had been.
A long-anticipated letter from Carsina arrived enfolded in a bare note from my sister. I tore it open, and for the first two pages her flowering phrases and curly handwriting cheered me. But by the third page the charm of her innocent affection and her girlish fantasies about the wonderful life we would have were suddenly worn thin. What, I abruptly wondered, did she actually know of me at all? What would she think of me if I failed my history exam and condemned my entire patrol to Academy expulsion? Would she still find me as attractive if I were facing the prospect of enlisting as a common soldier? Would her father? Or did her parents, like my aunt, have ambitions and plans, and consider their daughter merely a valuable item to be bartered for alliance and advantage?
I tried to shake myself free of my dismal thoughts and forced myself to read to the end of her letter. There was, I realized, nothing new in it. She had sewn a sampler and baked two loaves of pumpkin bread from a new recipe. Did I like pumpkin bread? She so looked forward to cooking for me and our darling children as they came along. She had already begun to fill her hope chest. She enclosed a drawing she had done of our initials intertwining. It was what she was embroidering on the corners of the good linen pillowcases her grandmother had given to her for her future home. She hoped I liked it. She closed with the wish that I would think of her, and that I would send her some blue lace like I’d sent my sister if I had the opportunity to get to town.
It suddenly struck me that what I knew of Carsina was that she was pretty and well mannered, laughed easily, danced well, and got along excellently with my sister. In the short time I’d spent with my cousin, I’d gotten to know Epiny better than I knew Carsina. I suddenly wondered if Carsina might be as eccentric and strong-willed as Epiny, but more adept at covering it up. I wondered if Carsina would ever want to hold a séance or spend half the morning wandering about the house in her nightgown. I felt very unsettled as I folded up her letter. It was all Epiny’s fault. Before I had met her, I had assumed that women were rather like dogs or horses. If one came of good bloodlines and had been properly trained, one had only to let her know what was expected of her, and she would cheerfully carry it out. I don’t mean that I thought women were dumb animals; quite the contrary, I had believed them wonderfully sensitive and loving creatures. I simply did not understand why any woman would wish to change her station or do otherwise than her husband’s or father’s wishes. What could she stand to gain by it? If a true woman dreamed of a home and family and a respectable husband, did she not betray that dream and undermine it when she defied the natural authority of her father or husband? So it had always seemed to me. Now Epiny had shown me that women could be sly, self-indulgent, deceptive, and rebellious. She made me doubt the virtue of every woman. Did even my sisters conceal such wiles behind their bland gazes?
The sudden uncertainty I felt about my wife-to-be, coupled with my anxiety about the upcoming exams, put me in a foul temper. I said little at our noon meal and could scarcely bear to watch Natred and Kort exchanging comments about their most recent missives from their sweethearts. It did not help my mood to see how longingly Spink followed their conversation. He looked a wreck. His uniform, never well fitted to him, hung on his thin frame, unbrushed and rather spotted with mud about the cuffs. His eyes were red, his hair unruly, and his skin gone sallow from too many sleepless nights. The rumor of his probation had spread throughout the Academy, though not the reason for it. It made him an object of curiosity and speculation, and if he had had the spirit to pay attention to the stares that followed him, I’m sure he would have been annoyed.
The night before exams, Spink was sick to his stomach. I couldn’t tell if it was nervousness or if the prolonged lack of sleep had made him genuinely ill. Halfway through our final cramming session, he simply gave up. He closed his books and without a word, only a doleful glance around at us, went off to bed. Our mood, not bright to begin with, sank into the depths. Gord was the next to surrender. “Guess I’m either ready for them or not. I’ve done the best I can,” he observed. He heaved himself to his feet and began to stack up his books.
“Done as much as you can for now, and will do as much as you should tomorrow,” Trist observed. He made it a statement, not a question. His meaning was clear to all of us. Gord didn’t rise to it.
“I’ll do all I can to pass every one of my exams well and keep our patrol safe from culling. More than that, none of us can do.”
“One of us could do more, if he had the balls to do it. If he really cared about the rest of the patrol.” Trist raised his voice on the last sentence, to be certain Gord had heard it. The closing of the bedroom door was his only response. Trist uttered an obscenity and sagged back in his chair. “That fat bastard is going to do us all in with his phony honor. He’s probably hoping we’ll all be culled. Then he can go home to his trough, say it wasn’t his fault, and forget about being a soldier. I’m going to bed.”
Trist slammed his book shut disdainfully, as if there were no use in further studying, as if all hinged on Gord and Spink and none of us could do anything to change our fates.
Rory closed his books more quietly. “I’m done in,” he said with resignation. “My head is as stuffed as it can get. I’m going to bed and dream about Dark Evening. Our scores won’t be posted until after the break. So I’m going to go out and enjoy myself in Old Thares. Might be the only opportunity I ever have. Night, fellows.”
“He’s got a point,” Caleb declared. “I, for one, am going to give myself a night such as I’ll never forget. I’ve heard the whores will be free that night, but just in case, I’ve saved two months’ allowance. I’ll leave them limping, I will.”
“You’ll be the one limping, after you come down with the dick scald. You hear what happened to Corporal Hawley from Shinter House? Dick scald so bad he couldn’t even piss without screaming. Don’t take a chance on the whores, friend.” This from Rory, over his shoulder as he left.
“Ha! Hawley was too cheap to go to a good house. Took alley girls, is what I heard. Not my idea of fun, standing up and thrusting while some poor girl knocks the back of her head against a brick wall.”
“I’m for bed.” Kort’s voice betrayed his amused disgust with them both. “Good luck, everyone.” As he stood, Natred did, too. I began stacking my books, as did every other man at the table.
Tomorrow, I knew, would determine my entire future. It burned in my heart that even if I scored perfectly on every test tomorrow, one of my fellows could bring me low. I looked round at them, and for a moment I knew hatred for Colonel Stiet and the Academy and even my fellow cadets.
Later, as I lay in bed, I closed my eyes and tried to grope my way toward sleep, but could not reach it. Eyes closed, body relaxed, my mind hovered in the place between wakefulness and rest. I felt I dangled, helpless, over an abyss and that I had no power to save myself from falling. The feeling was doubtless responsible for my nightmares about the tree woman.
Yet my dream began not with terror, but with comfort. I was in my beloved forest, at peace. Sunlight broke through the canopy overhead and dappled my skin, and I smiled as I looked at it on my bared arms and legs. The rich smells of humus rose around me. I picked up a handful and considered it. It was a layer from yesterday’s leaf down to the black loam that had been a leaf five years ago. Busy little insects toiled in it. A tiny worm coiled and uncoiled desperately on my palm. I laughed at his fears and restored all to the forest soil. All was well. I said as much to my mentor. “The world lives and dies as it should today.”
The tree woman nodded to me, making shadows shift over my flesh. “I am proud of you, that you come to understand that the dying is a part of the living. For too long you clung to the notion that each life was significant and too important to perish for the whole. But now you see it, don’t you?”
“I do. And it comforts me.” And it did. At least it comforted the part of me that sat on the forest floor at the feet of the great tree, his back to its rough bark. That part of me saw no woman, but felt her and heard her speaking to me.
Yet the part of me that stood in the shadowy space between dreams and waking was horrified at my behavior. I consorted with the enemy. There was no other way to look at it. My worst fears were confirmed when I heard her say, “It is good that you have come to the understanding. It will make it easier for you.”
“Did you ever have doubts, when the magic first claimed you?” I asked her.
I felt her wistful sigh in the gentle rustling of the leaves above me. “Of course I did. I had plans for my life, and dreams. Then came a time of drought. I thought we would all die. I made a spirit journey, just as you did. A choice was offered to me just as it was offered to you. I chose the magic and the magic chose me. The magic used me, and my people survived.”
Unbreathing in the shadow, I heard my traitor self ask her, “The magic will use me also?”
“Yes. It will use you as you use it. It will give to you, and in the process, it will take from you. You may mourn what is taken. But the loss will make you stronger and truer to your task.”
My dream self made a gesture with his hands. It could have expressed either release or offering. I sensed it signified acceptance. I felt impotent fury that this other self would passively accede to such a fate. And in my fury, I was somehow separate from him, and could observe him. He filled me with contempt. He leaned back, naked and smiling in the gentle balm of the sun. His skin was evenly browned, as if he had never known a scrap of clothing. He had dirt under his fingernails, and his bare feet and ankles were permanently grimed. He was a man turned into a beast of the forest. Yet he was pleased with himself, content in whatever life this was he lived. I hated him, hated myself and my weakness with a terrifying passion. Then, as he shifted, I felt a thrill of fear strengthen me. I had thought that dream self my twin, but now I saw he was not. What I had taken for a head as shorn of hair as my own was actually a bald pate. At the crown of his skull, sprouting like a rooster’s tail, was a sheaf of hair. I knew with sudden certainty that his crop of hair would exactly match the missing piece of scalp on my scarred head. This was the stolen self that Epiny had spoken about with Spink.
The tree had continued to speak to my dream self. “It is good that you are prepared, for soon I will reach out to you with the magic. I have considered long whether it was wise for me to take action on my own. Usually, when the magic takes a vessel, the magic soon acts through the vessel, and the events that will make all right for the People are set into motion. But you say you have done nothing; that the magic has not acted through you. Of this you are certain?”
I watched my dream self. He sat silent a moment and then shrugged eloquently. He did not know. I sensed that he had reached for me, perhaps trying to know my thoughts and what this self did in the real world, yet he could no more truly comprehend who and what I was than I could understand him. Perhaps Epiny’s summoning had broken my dreams and made me aware of him. His topknot of hair, I now saw, was braided at the base and tarred with something that made it stand up from his scalp. A bit of green vine wrapped it like a schoolgirl’s ribbon. It looked silly to me, as foolish as one of Epiny’s hats.
The tree sighed, a heavy rustling of wind through her branches. “Then act I shall, though I am full of misgiving at taking this upon myself. Old as I am, wise as I have become through the many seasons, I still do not see as the magic sees. The magic sees to the end of all permutations. The magic knows which falling grain of sand will escalate into a landslide. I see more clearly than any living member of the People. But even so, I tremble at what I will do.”
Indeed, a curious shiver did run through the tree, a quivering of the leaves that seemed independent of any stir of air. My dream self folded his hands and bowed his head in submission. “Do as you must, Tree Woman. I will be ready.”
“I will do as I must, never fear! The dance is no longer sufficient. We trusted to it, but it is failing. Our trees fall and with every tree that dies, wisdom is lost. Power is lost. The forest is what binds our worlds together. As the intruders cut the forest, they are like mice nibbling at a rope. The bridge between the worlds grows weaker. The magic feels itself weakening, and knows it must work quickly. I feel it as I feel the sap of spring that rushes through me. I know we must make a bridge of our own. So there is no time for you to thrash and blunder your way. There is no time to let you make your own mistakes. Tomorrow, you must pass the test.”
Test. Was that the word that woke me once again to my second, observing self. Suddenly I knew that I existed as my true self in another place, and in that true self, would face a real test tomorrow. In the curious way of dream logic, knowing that the scalp-locked self before me was a stolen part of me suddenly gave me power over him. I spoke with his mouth. “This is a dream. Just a dream. You are not real, and this self is not real. I am the real Nevare. And tomorrow, I will pass the test that will let me go on to be a soldier for my people.”
The bark of the tree opened. Creepers sprouted from the cracks and wrapped me. She seized me and held me fast. When she spoke, I knew she spoke to my real self. “You speak more truly than you know. Tomorrow you face a test. You will pass it and make the sign and you will then fight for the People.”
“Let go of me! Leave me alone! I am a horse soldier, as my father was before me. I serve King Troven and the people of Gernia. Not you! You are not even real!”
“Aren’t I? Aren’t I? Then wake up, soldier’s son, and see how real I am!”
And she flung me away from her. Suddenly I was falling, falling into the crevasse I had so perilously crossed on the flimsy bridges. Her creepers bound my arms tightly to my sides. I tried to scream, but I was falling so fast I could not catch my breath.
I’ve heard it said that although dreams of falling are common, the dreamer always wakes before he hits the bottom. I did not. I hit the rocks. I felt my rib cage give on impact, felt my arms and legs rebound from the slam and then slap the earth again. Everything went black and spun around me. I tasted blood. I groaned and forced my eyes open. I dared not move at first, for surely every bone in my body must be shattered. I lay still, trying to make sense of what I saw.
Moonlight came in faintly at the window. I made out the outline of Spink’s bed next to mine. I was on the floor of the dormitory, I gradually realized. My tangled bedding was all that bound me. I wallowed out of it and managed to sit up. I’d had a nightmare and fallen out of bed. I had been right. It had all been just a dream. A very strange dream, but only a dream, and probably the result of the nervousness I felt about the test I faced tomorrow and Epiny’s strange notions about me. My head hurt. I put my hand up, and for a moment I could have sworn I felt a tarred scalp-lock standing up from the crown of my head. I brushed my fingers against it, and then it was gone and I felt only the scar on my scalp. My fingers came away damp with blood. My fall had broken it open again. Groaning, I crawled up off the hard floor and back onto my bed. Finally, I slept.