Seventeen Stones (28 page)

Mia cleared her throat.  “He
didn’t say he was planning to duel the Magus, he said he would ‘take care’ of
him.  Couldn’t that mean this person was planning to do something
like…manipulate him…or…”

The
headmistress cut her off.   “It could mean any number of things.  One thing it
surely means is that I need to write the Magus immediately and complain about
Chilton and Avery, and tell him that there is at least one other council member
involved.”   Her face, though stiff from wand use, managed a smile.   “Thank
you for bringing this to me.  I trust you’ll keep this information to
yourself?  The fewer people that know about this, the better.”

She took a closer look at Mia
and pulled a leaf out of her hair.

“Whatever were you doing on
that part of the campus anyway?”

***

When
Mia finally showed up at the dorms, dinner was being served.  Ella cast a
worried glance at her while the others looked a bit more reproachful.   She
couldn’t tell them everything in the public dining room so she laid their fears
to rest with the tidbit she could explain.  

“The headmistress is going to make sure that no one is
required to ride anything they don’t feel comfortable riding.  She said we
couldn’t afford to lose wand wielders to accidents.”  

***

Two
weeks into the new term, Mia was studying with Sarah in the common room when a
gorgeous purple dragonfly buzzed into the room and said in Vivian’s voice “Tea
room! C’mon!”  Sarah eyed the insect with great dislike as it flew back to its
mistress.  Vivian’s parents had sent her the tiny messenger for her mid-winter
gift.  “Is it just me or is this the most annoying fad that has ever been or
ever will be?”  Mia shrugged.  She didn’t own one yet, but she’d seen a bright
pink model with iridescent blue wings a few days ago.  “I don’t know.  It’s a
convenient way to send messages.” 

Sarah
fumed.  “Except that you can only record five words with the dragonfly’s tiny
little mind, so everyone’s talking in code.  NF: Not Funny.  WAA: Wandering
Around Aimlessly.  SAAB:  Smile and Act Brainless.  Uggg.”  Mia ducked her head
to hide a grin.  She hadn’t heard any of those, but she might start using WAA. 

The
sudden fad was based on the fact that the dragonflies were fairly inexpensive (they
only lived six months), the enchantment was simple, and feeding them was as
easy as ordering an extra bag of mosquito eggs with the rest of your potion
supplies.  The dragonflies ranged in price from the indigenous small green
variety that could be purchased for a couple of copper pieces to the top of the
line black model that was the size of a sparrow and cost more that it weighed
in gold.  The smaller ones were able to record a few words and fly a mile or so,
the largest were able to send whole paragraphs and could travel all over the City. 
Most of the students were sporting either the small green dragonflies or a
yellow breed that originated near the western desert.  Professor Fain had
invested in one of the great black monsters, but he was the only teacher who
seemed interested.

Professor
Marshal swatted any dragonfly that dared buzz in arm’s reach, while the
normally sweet Professor Ambrose had threatened to throw any that delivered
messages in her class into the nearest cauldron.  Professor Cavendish accepted
them more gracefully, anticipating that there would be fewer mosquitoes come
spring.

Mia
and Sarah put away their homework and hurried to the tea room.  They were late. 
Everyone was meeting at six.  A few of the boys had started a band and they
were supposed to hold a concert about that time. 

The
normal noise of a hundred students was tripled in the tea room.  Everyone was
sending messages from opposite ends of the room.  Mia began to see Sarah’s
point about the noisy little insects.  They were tolerable in two’s and
three’s, but fifty of them in a room (speaking in code, with different people’s
voices) were maddening. 

The
band was still setting up as they walked in but started to play about the time
they sat down beside Vivian.  Gabriel was sitting next to her.  Lizzy was on
the other side of the table glaring at the Stubbs boy, who was weaving his way
through the crowd with two cups of tea and a plate of sticky buns floating
behind him..  Young Mr. Stubbs looked uncomfortable with Lizzy’s unfriendly
gaze, but it didn’t deter him as he slid a cup in front of Beth.  Lizzy
narrowed her eyes and looked away.  Mia tried to ask where Ella had gotten off
to, but before the words were out of her mouth she heard the unmistakable sound
of Ella’s voice. 

With
each of the boys playing as fast as their guitars, harp, and drums would allow,
Ella sang in her lower register.  The effect was mesmerizing.  Within seconds
the rambunctious audience quieted.  A gigantic blond boy played lead guitar; his
fingers worked magic as they flew across the strings.  The song reached its crescendo,
and Ella used more and more of her range until she ended on a glorious C above
high C.  The audience was screaming and clapping, not looking at all like the
stodgy students of the college.  A crowd of villagers at a harvest fair
couldn’t have been more enthusiastic.  Martin Ainsley and his group were
conspicuous for their silence in one corner, but Mia barely spared him a
glance.  Her friend was obviously enjoying the applause.  Ella bowed to the
crowd, grinned at the band, and stepped down from the raised wooden dais that
was serving as a stage. 

The
boys played a slower ballad, and a few couples started dancing, but Ella’s
friends instantly grilled her, asking about the performance.  She shrugged. 
“We just decided to try it this afternoon.  It isn’t as if I have time to be in
a band.  The blond playing guitar, Nathan, is from my village, the baker’s
son.  He comes home on holidays and knew I could hit that note from hearing me
sing with my brothers and mother.  He’s friends with my oldest brother, John.” 

Mia
expected that Nathan’s presence in the band might have acted as a check to
Martin’s behavior.  The young man in question grinned down at Ella from the
stage.  His arms were the size of small trees and his palms were larger than
her head.  He stood at least six feet, five inches tall and probably weighed
two hundred and forty pounds, all muscle.  He sang in a pleasant baritone
during most of the other songs, a younger boy harmonizing in tenor from a small
harp. 

Vivian
whispered “Funny, he doesn’t look like any baker’s son I’ve ever seen.  I would
have pegged him for a blacksmith or a woodcutter…or a troll.”  Mia giggled a
little, but the music was loud enough to cover both the comment and the
reaction.

The
rest of the performance was lackluster without Ella’s incredible range, so the
girls wandered home before the concert was officially over.  Vivian wandered
somewhat slower than the others, with Gabriel’s arm around her waist.  Mia
didn’t slow down.  She still had homework to do for Creation tomorrow, and
she’d be an eperbubulious if she’d let Martin Ainsley really beat her in that class,
even if he was beating her on paper.      

***

Sarah
was extremely frustrated with the quality of information they’d been able to
glean, though no one could argue with the sheer quantity of information Vivian
was able to her hands on.  They knew more about the petty concerns of the
council members than Mia ever wanted to know, but there wasn’t any information
about the catatonic state of the young mages.  They were hampered in their information
gathering efforts by real life.  They were a group of fourteen and fifteen year
olds, with no direct access to the records of the incidents they were trying to
investigate…if any records existed.

Professor
Fain flatly refused to answer Mia’s questions about the council or the Magus. 
“Investigating is what Greatlord Avery is supposed to be doing.  You need to
keep your head down and study.”  Mia took that tidbit back to the girls. 
Vivian was less than pleased.  “The Council is finally moving and they assign
Avery to investigate?”  She shook her head.  “Avery practically lives in
Greatlord Strathorne’s pocket.” 

Sarah
had received a pretty good overview of how the council worked from her
grandfather, who was a member.  She didn’t ask for specifics, since his sense
of honor wouldn’t let unfounded suspicions blacken the names of his fellow
council members, but he wasn’t above telling his granddaughter privately to
avoid certain parties.  “Avoid Greatlord Strathorne.  There’s no reason you
should encounter him, but he’s a cad and he’s not one to cross.  Prosper’s not
fit company for a young girl, and neither is his crony Greatlord Rainly.  Greatlord
Avery is proof that if you have enough clout you can get your children
proclaimed Greatlords whether they have the power or not.  He’s a bumbling
idiot, the worst possible sort of person to be in charge of the City Guard,
especially now…”  He’d glanced at Sarah and changed the subject.  “Devon and
Forney are capitol gentlemen, as is old Harv Eggerton.”

Sarah
flipped through the notebook with evident displeasure.  “From what I can tell,
you can trust my Grandfather.  The rest of the council is iffy.”  Mia ignored
her sour attitude and continued to scratch out an essay for Creation.  “It was
always a long shot, Sarah.” 

Vivian
snorted, at least as annoyed with the information as Sarah was.  “Well, I for
one am not giving up.  I want to know what they’re up to.”  Her determination
was somewhat unsurprising since she was growing steadily more attached to one
of the more powerful third year students.  Mia didn’t think that Vivian needed
to worry.  Gabriel was from a prominent old blood family. 

Ella
was chewing the end of her wooden pen in a way that made Sarah avert her eyes. 
She asked “Has anyone asked the servants?  Real live people do most of the work
in the City.  They don’t talk much, but they see everything.” 

Vivian nodded.  “But why would they confide in us? 
Anyone who knew anything important would also know that they’d better keep
their mouth shut.”  Ella smiled, just a little.  “I’ll ask around, see what I
can do.”  Vivian was hardly content with such an answer, but it was the only
one Ella would offer.

***

One evening they fell asleep to harsh winter winds and
snow flurries.  The next morning Mia noticed the first snow drops poking their
green shoots out of the drifts.  It progressed rapidly from there.  Spring
fever infected the campus like any other disease, with every student trying in
his or her way to welcome the end of winter.

Professor
Tate’s classes reached a new level of difficulty during spring.  “Now tell me
class, why did Magus Jonas decide to build the canal?”  The class raised their
hands.  The text clearly stated that the canal piped water out of a marsh and
into the grain lands.  One of the other girls in the class was called on and
duly gave the answer.  Professor Tate grinned.  “That’s a quote from the book,
but the book didn’t quite get it right in this case.  That’s the difficulty
with history.  We can confirm
what
people did, but the why is elusive. 
Half the time people don’t know why they react the way they do in the first
place.  Even when they do know why they reacted that way, they won’t just come
out and tell other people their true motivations.” 

The
professor adjusted her glasses (which seemed ever determined to escape down her
nose).  “When it comes to Greatlord Jonas, we have some research that can
help.  His oldest daughter died in the swamp while studying the native flora. 
His wife went stone-mad afterward and had to be confined to the estate.  We
know this because Greatlord Jonas kept excellent records. He paid nurses to
take care of his wife and healers to come to the estate to try to cure the
madness.  He even left a legacy in his will to fund research to discover the
cause of stone-madness after he died.  He drained the swamp that used to be
where Greenvale is today.  The addition of another river caused the Delta swamp
down south to triple in size, eventually displacing thousands of people,
including several estates.  Of course, the canal has provided much needed water
to the grain belt, assuring that we never have another repeat of the Great
Famine.”

A
quiet knock at the door alerted the professor to a shadowy figure outside.  She
bobbed her head and turned to the class “Read chapter forty-five and forty-six
for the next ten minutes or so.”  With no more explanation than that, she
rushed out of the room. 

Vivian
was out of her chair, listening at the door faster than Mia could open her book
to the proper page.  The rest of the class was watching Vivian.  Mia hissed for
her friend to come back, but Vivian’s dark head was heading out the door.  She
turned to Lizzy and Beth.  “Should we follow?”  Lizzy shook her head and dug around
in Vivian’s bag.  Then she opened it to the third page of chapter forty-five. 
Vivian raced in and slid into seat seconds before the Professor re-entered the
room.  She threw a grateful look at Lizzy as the distracted Professor
returned.