Spiral Path (Night Calls Series Book 3) (22 page)

“
I
was finished with my scones and tea,” she said. “But now you must eat a bit
before your first examination.”

“
The
drops need a half hour before they’re broken out,” I started, gesturing to
them. “And the pot—”

“
You
may take the pot to the kitchen and leave it next to the breakfast dishes,” my
cousin said. “I am confident that any child of Garda knows how to clean
anything set before her. Here is your list of classes today. The movement of
students signals the next class. I will turn the drops when the time comes.”

The cleaning comment, I decided, was a compliment to my
mother, and would also have to go into the letter. Taking the small list in one
hand, I grabbed the handle of the pot with the other, thanked Cousin Esme, and
wrestled the heavy door open.

o0o

Breakfast was plenty of bacon rashers and fresh bread
dipped in egg batter and fried. I knew that dish; my mother made it for
birthdays. I could tell that Mrs. Gardener added cream and spices to hers,
cinnamon and something else I did not recognize. The bread was oat, and it made
a wonderful meal.

Catherin and Margaret arrived before the lines at the food station
became long. They both wanted to know what I was assigned to today, and pored
over the list with interest.

“Professor Livingston has you seeing almost everyone today.
One of us should come find you and take you to your next appointment,” Catherin
said, and they quickly divided up the list of names between them. “Oh! You will
go to Professor Sonneault first!” Immediately she started chattering in French,
gesturing to different names on the list. I started to protest, but Margaret,
in French, reminded me that I needed to hear French.

“You will like her, I think. She speaks of the many lands
she has visited, and how interesting it is to meet people from different
cultures.” Margaret pointed to the second name on her list. “Professor Shipley
is the Ancient Languages teacher,” she went on, her words precise. “He teaches
us Latin, and the boys who wish to go on to college also learn Greek. I suspect
he also knows a lot of other old languages, like Sanskrit and Old Saxon,” she
added, tilting her head, her voice soft as if this was both a confidence and a
secret swapped between old friends. “He has many old books and scrolls in his
office, and I don’t recognize the languages at all.”

“He’s dry as a bone,” Catherin added, spacing out her words
in a low, exaggerated manner, and I stifled a laugh. I thought I knew what
Catherin meant, but her string of words sounded funny in French. “You will
understand when you meet him. He does not have a use for people who won’t
properly study languages, since language is ‘crucial to advanced magic.’” Once
again she lowered her voice and spaced her words with precision. I wondered if
Professor Shipley sounded like that. “So if he treats you like a servant, it is
not personal—he treats everyone that way until they prove themselves.”

“Professor De Lancey is so kind! He teaches Rules, and
beginning magic, and also advanced potions and herbs,” Margaret said, touching
the next name.

“And then Professor Tonneman.” Catherin’s voice was
brighter, and she sat back in her chair, her entire body tense with excitement.
“So polished! Such a gentleman! He teaches ritual magic, but that is more
advanced work. Professor Brown is not on the list, is she?”

“It says ‘Ask Miss Rutledge to introduce you to Professor
Brown,’” Margaret read off my list. “I will ask Mrs. Gardener for some cookies
to take as a gift. Professor Brown adores sweets. It is not fair that she is so
slender and elegant.”

That sounded funny, since I thought of both Margaret and
Catherin as slender, dainty women. But for now I would defer to their judgment.
I would let Margaret arrange a suitable gift for the professor—but why for her,
and not the others?

Students were starting to leave. It was time to face my new
teachers . . . professors. I touched the lumps under my clothes that were my wand and
athame, wishing I had the slightest idea how to use them.

Foolishness. That was why I was here, to learn these things.

Some things are hard to learn out of a book; that’s why I
was with Marta. And Marta had her reasons for wanting me here with Cousin Esme.

Someday Marta might even tell me those reasons.

Catherin and Margaret were right; Professor Sonneault
sparkled like my mother’s cherry mead. I was shocked when I walked into the
room Catherin had practically dragged me to, because Professor Sonneault was
taller than me, maybe as tall as Marta.

Entering Professor Sonneault’s classroom, I had the feeling
that the instructors were volunteering the time normally allotted to prepare
for their classes to evaluate me. I found the lady writing French words in a
beautiful script on a black slate mounted in a frame, like a large picture
frame or mirror. Like Cousin Esme’s board, it stood on a double tripod of oak
legs.

Professor Sonneaut appeared to be my parents’ age. Her dress
was from an earlier time, more like what my mother preferred to wear. Elegant,
thin, long stripes of red and white ran from her shoulders to her white boots,
with a petticoat apron of muslin embroidered with tiny flowers tossed over the
full skirt that gathered at her waist.

With her white gloves, red silk flowers, and a snowy white
feather plume in her dark hair, she was a striking sight. I gave a tiny curtsy
as I introduced myself, and met her gaze.

It was like brushing against some elusive woodland creature
of power. Her dark eyes held secrets . . . and no reflection. There was a stone
quarry a few days ride from our home, one that had filled with water. No one
knew the depth of it; the bottom could not be seen, even at midday.

Professor Sonneault’s eyes were like that, a hard rock
quarry filled with clear water and mystery. I also had a brief sensation of
being . . . weighed, somehow.

The moment passed.

Her entire outfit was nothing but a façade. There was
nothing soft and fluffy about the French teacher, despite her pretty picture. I
would make very sure she knew nothing of my history.

Perhaps I would find that I liked Professor Sonneault.

But I did not trust her.

Quickly she sat down on a well-upholstered chair and
gestured that I was to sit upon its mate.

“
Bienvenue!
Welcome to the world of modern languages!” the lady began.
“Parlez-vous
français
?”

“Oui, je parle un peu
français
.”
Yes, I speak a little French.
It seemed
like a good idea to qualify my response by adding “a little” to it.

And then we were off. The professor was very clever, slowly
increasing her speed as she asked about my home and schooling. I was convinced
that I was making a fool of myself, stumbling as I described what I knew of New
York and the estate, when Professor Sonneault changed topics, suddenly
chattering about the gardens, the mazes, and the home farm, where the produce
and animals for the household were grown and raised.

I knew the names of most of the foods and the animals, and
was able to talk about how people trapped fur where I lived. Since the DuBose
family tanned furs before taking them to market, I knew the names for various
fur-bearing creatures and also for foods Mrs. DuBose liked to make, like
coq
au vin.

“Excellent, excellent!” she said at one point. “You must
come to the milliner’s with me this month and tell me what fur each hat is made
from.”

“I won’t know any milliner terms—“ I began.

“In English, Alfreda, you are doing quite well but are not
ready for light social conversation yet. We will fix that!” the professor
rushed on.

Professor Sonneault was apparently pleased by my poor
attempts to keep up with her. At one point she abruptly changed directions,
asking me if my name was Swedish, and did I know any German?

I answered her in Norwegian, and then in my careful German.
“Magnifique!”
she said loudly in French, and then dropped right into German.

Here I understood much more than I spoke, so I could answer
her
“Ja”
and
“Nein”
at appropriate places.

Italian was clearly a loss. Spanish was better, but not very
much. I could demonstrate my two dozen words of Russian, but had no idea how
they were spelled or put together. My father told me that the Russian alphabet
was different from our own.

“Have you learned anything else that you can converse in?”
she finally asked in English.

It was a relief to hear something that I completely
understood! In Gaelic I said: “I am blessed with the words of the Emerald Isle,
but only my mother’s family speaks it.”

The lady burst out in a hearty laugh, her hands gesturing in
Gallic amusement. She answered me in Gaelic! We had a brief conversation about
whether my mother had taught me the art of fine Irish brewing, and if I could
make good soda bread.

“Très bien!”
she finally said, her fingers slashing
sideways. “Already I can see a half-dozen students benefiting from your
company. Mademoiselle, Professor Livingston will have a French-English
dictionary for you. You are to start thus—six new words of magic or herbs each
day. When learning six a day has become comfortable, then we will add in words
that pertain to current affairs of the world.” Her last words were evenly
spaced, as if emphasizing the foreign nature of the English we spoke. Something
of her words lingered in the room, almost like an echo.

“You will have conversational French three days a week—
lundi,
mercredi et vendredi,”
she went on.

Monday, Wednesday and
Friday,
I translated silently.

“Mardi et jeudi,
you begin conversational German. You
will have a notebook for grammar, eh? Later will be time for Italian.”

“Oui, madame,”
I
said.

“And now, you must go see Professor Shipley. He will teach
you the ancient languages.” Something about this clearly amused the lady, but
she did not explain the joke.

I thanked Professor Sonneault and made my way out into the
corridor. Doors opened and children streamed into the hallway, their voices
raised in shouts and conversation. Farther down the hall I could see older
youths and maidens pushing through the doors to the far staircase and merging
into clusters.

Margaret emerged from the crowd, walking swiftly toward me. “You
have survived your first class with Professor Sonneault,” she said as she
reached me. “Congratulations!”

“She was very kind,” I replied, leaning back toward the wall
to let two small boys push by us. “I will need to get a dictionary from Professor
Livingston. I already have work to be done!”

“That means that you are in a higher class than the
beginners,” Margaret told me, touching my arm lightly and gesturing down the
corridor. “We will get your books when there is time. I am sure Professor Livingston
will have them delivered to your room soon. They must be spelled, of course.”

“The books are spelled?” I asked.

“Every book that belongs to the school is spelled,” was her
answer. “If the book goes a single foot beyond the boundaries of Windward
estate, it begins to shriek. Of course some of the boys must test the spell!
Books are valuable, and books of magic even more so. I have heard that an early
student had gambling debts and gave the books up as security on his loan. He
was quite stunned when the pawnbroker expected a tenfold increase before
allowing the boy to redeem his grimoire. The value of the books was much more
than that young man expected. Then he was caught among the Livingstons, who
owned the books, his father, and the pawnbroker. The school started spelling
the books after that incident.”

“I would imagine that it was not a pleasant experience,” I
said, shivering.

“Not at all,” Margaret agreed. “Rumor has it that his father
paid a thousand pounds to recover the books from the pawnbroker. He was a lord,
but even for a lord, that was a great deal of money!”

It was an unimaginable amount of money—I was speechless. How
was I going to protect my books? Possessions could be taught to announce their
owner—it was one of the spells that had appeared in my
Denizens of the Night
.
Could I put the spell on as an over-spell, as the temporary custodian of the
books?

“Here is Professor Shipley’s room,” she said, stopping
before a heavy door. “I forgot to tell you. If any of the professors release
you well before class change, just go to your room. We will come for you there.”

“How do we know when class ends?” I asked.

“Class begins on the hour, and lasts forty-five minutes,”
Margaret said. “That allows enough time to go the farthest distance necessary
before the next class. The advanced classes are on the second floor of the
school wing, and I think that most of your classes will be there. You have
finished most of the early classes, haven’t you?”

“I need to learn how to mend quills,” I admitted.

“I can teach you that . . . no, you are left-handed. We’ll get a
senior student to teach you how to trim them.” Margaret’s tone was reassuring. “For
now, go meet Professor Shipley. Latin is the language of ritual magic. He will
need to assign you to a class!” Smiling, she waved farewell as she hurried on
to the stairwell.

Well. I took a slow, deep breath to settle myself, and
turned the knob of the heavy door. Inside was a room with eight long tables, an
aisle down the middle, and a desk in the front of the room, set slightly to one
side. At the front, not one but two black slate boards faced the tables. A
neatly dressed man was writing with chalk upon one of them, tilting the board
so that he wrote on a flat surface.