Calla's Story

Chapter 5

Five

After clearing my throat and pulling my shoulders back, I knock on Olive Stockland’s door. Ryn is right. He got me into the Guild, he spent all summer training me, he quizzed me before every exam, and he saved me from making an i***t of myself in front of the Head Councilor. So now it’s time to step up and do the rest of this on my own. It’s time to prove I have just as much right to be here as every faerie who’s spent the past four years—

“Come in!”

Okay, time to focus.

I place my hand on the doorknob, then hesitate as it hits me: I’m about to meet my mentor. My guardian mentor. This is really happening! I twist the knob and push the door open.

Olive’s office is a mess. The desk is invisible beneath piles of reed paper, several knives, some dirty mugs, and a broken crossbow. Her chair is piled with boxes, and the chair on my side of the desk has a plate of something that was probably breakfast sitting on it. On the right side of the room, a tall woman—Olive, presumably—is stacking books on the highest shelf of a cabinet that reaches the ceiling. She flicks her right hand in a repetitive motion, causing the books to fly one by one from her left hand onto the shelf.

When she’s done, she steps back, pushes stray wisps of short hair away from her face, and looks at me. “Yes?”

My hand tightens around my bag strap. I clear my throat once more. “Hi. Good morning. I’m Calla.” When she does nothing more than place her hands on her hips and blink at me, I add, “Calla Larkenwood. Um, I’m the new trainee starting with the fifth years. You’re … my mentor?”

Olive lets out a puff of air and gives me a grim smile. “Wonderful. As if I don’t have enough on my plate already, I now get to mentor yet another trainee. And, to make matters worse, it’s a trainee who thinks she can skip four years of hard work and start at the end.”

“I …” I pause with my mouth partially open, stunned by her immediate hostility.

“Well?” she says. “Do you have anything to say, or is that vacant expression something I should get used to?”

I snap my mouth shut and turn my gaze to the floor in humiliation. Why, why, why did the Council have to give me a mentor who doesn’t think I should even be here? Or do all the mentors feel this way about the new trainee who ‘thinks she can skip four years of hard work’? An ache behind my eyes warns me that tears are on the way. I blink several times until I’m certain the tears won’t surface. I’ve had practice in this department. I’ve dealt with people like this before. And, while it isn’t ideal to have a mentor who thinks I’m nothing but a waste of her time, I can make it work if I have to. It’s what I’ve done at every other school.

I place my bag on the floor and cross the room. After removing the plate of congealed food and balancing it on top of a pile of reed paper, I sit on the chair. “It doesn’t matter if you don’t like me,” I tell her. “I’m used to people not liking me, or avoiding me at all costs, or looking at me like I’ve got dangerous Unseelie blood running in my veins. It doesn’t change the fact that I’ve already proved to the Council I belong here, and it doesn’t change the fact that I am going to become a guardian.”

She blinks again but recovers quickly. “Well, I don’t know what you’re sitting down for then. Your first lesson started two minutes ago.”

“What?” I stand quickly, forgetting that I’m supposed to be portraying an air of composure.

“Oh, I’m sorry, are you too high and mighty to bother with reading your timetable?”

“I don’t have a timetable. Aren’t you supposed to give that to me?”

Her glare becomes frostier. “I have enough people telling me how to do my job without Miss High-and-Mighty adding her two cents to the mix.” She yanks open a drawer on the other side of the desk, peers inside, and removes a scroll. “Here.” She strides past me, pushing the scroll into my hands as she goes. “Timetable, locker instructions, code of conduct, rules, and other things I don’t have time to explain. Follow me.”

I spin around to find that she’s already left the office. I grab my bag and hurry after her.

“The first part of fifth year consists of lessons, physical training and assignments,” she continues as we head down the corridor at a brisk pace. “Some assignments are written, but most are out in the field. Initially I’ll be observing some of those assignments, but you’ll soon be doing solos. For both kinds, you’ll report to me before and after. Any questions?”

“Uh—”

“Good,” she says as we reach the stairs. “In a few months, lessons will end, and you’ll spend all your time on physical training, solo assignments, and the occasional written assignment. Every kind of assignment earns you points. Points go toward your ranking. The rankings are displayed on a notice board in the training center, but all rankings will be removed several months before the end of the year as final rankings remain confidential until graduation.”

“Do points carry over from previous—”

“That’s the entrance you’ll come through every day.” She points across the foyer to the guarded entrance room as we reach the bottom of the stairs. “It’s the only part of this Guild accessible from the faerie paths. Make sure you wear your trainee pendant every day. You won’t be allowed in without it.”

Several questions come to mind, but I’m almost certain Olive will ignore me if I attempt to ask them.

“The dining hall is down here,” she says as we reach the other side of the foyer and enter a familiar corridor. “You’re welcome to eat all your meals there, unless, of course, Guild food isn’t good enough for you.”

“It’s—”

“Further down on the right is the training center, which I sincerely hope you’re familiar with by now. At the end of the corridor are the trainee lockers, and here on the left—” she stops beside a door that stands ajar “—we have the lesson rooms.”

Nervous adrenaline shoots through me as I hear voices on the other side of the door. Trainees are in there. My class. My fellow fifth years. People who’ve been friends for years. People who, just like Olive, might not want me here.

“Now.” Olive folds her arms and looks down at me. “I know the only reason you’re here is because your brother sweet-talked the Council into letting you do some kind of elaborate month-long audition. And I—”

“It wasn’t an audition,” I protest as indignation rises within me. “There were exams and assignments, and I passed every—”

“And I don’t like people who think they’re better than the rules we’ve all worked so hard to put in place,” she continues.

“But I haven’t broken any—”

“I also don’t like to be interrupted.”

I open my mouth to point out that she’s doing just as much interrupting as I am, but I decide against it. I’d rather not make this conversation worse than it already is.

“But you’re here now,” she says, “and there isn’t much I can do to change that. So I have only one more thing to say to you.” She leans closer. “Don’t embarrass me.” After a threatening pause, she straightens and walks away.

I stare at the door in front of me, frustration giving way to fear. Questions assault my mind as I raise my hand to the door. Do the trainees inside this room know about me already? Not just that I’m joining them, but do they know who I am? Have they heard the stories? The rumors? Do they know about the incidents?

I tell myself it doesn’t matter what these trainees have or haven’t heard. I focus on my mental fortress, making sure every thought is locked firmly within its imaginary walls. Then I push the door open—and the eyes of about twenty trainees fall on me. I’m too nervous to look directly at any of them. All I’m aware of is the sea of colors—blue, purple, red, palest green, and a dozen others—and the sudden hush in the room.

“Ah, here she is,” says the man standing at the front of the room. “This is Calla Larkenwood, everyone. Welcome, Calla.” He gives me a smile that appears to be far more genuine than the one Olive gave me. “I’m Irwin, and these are the fifth-year trainees. I’ve already mentioned to them that you’ll be joining us, and they’re excited to include you in their group.” He gives the class a pointed look, which clearly means that no one in this room is excited to include me in anything.

“Um, thanks,” I mutter. I spot an empty desk and head straight for it, keeping my eyes down. I slip into the chair and let my hair fall forward over my shoulders, shielding my face from the stares I have no doubt are still pointed at me.

“Anyway, as I was saying before you came in, Calla,” Irwin continues, “we’re beginning the year by taking a more detailed look at Guild history directly after the fall of Lord Draven.” I hear several groans from around the classroom. Irwin looks unimpressed. “Come now, people, this is your history. Your history.” He points a finger at a girl in the front row. “And yours. And yours.” More pointing. “You lived through it. Some of your parents helped shape it. And when you’re working for the Guild one day, you’ll need to understand exactly what went into restructuring our government and our laws, what measures were put in place to prevent another fall, what policies and regulations were changed, how the PCAIM Commission worked, why the Griffin List came into being after we discovered where all the Gifted got their abilities from, why the reptiscilla guardian petitions were unsuccessful—”

“Haven’t we done all that already?” a guy in the second row asks, interrupting Irwin’s long list. I can’t help agreeing with him. I definitely remember a question in my exam last week about reptiscilla guardian petitions.

“Yes, it’s all been mentioned before, but we’re going into more detail on everything. So.” He claps his hands together. “Please turn to page seventeen.”

The sound of rustling pages fills the air. I glance around and realize for the first time that almost everyone else has a textbook in front of them. It’s a textbook I decided not to bring with today because Ryn assured me no one ever starts lessons on the first day. I guess he was just as wrong about that as he was about Councilor Bouchard.

I’m about to swallow my embarrassment and raise my hand when a book plops onto the empty desk joined to mine and a girl slides into the chair. “I thought you might want to share,” she says, pulling her chair in and smiling at me. Her red eyes are a little scary, but her smile is friendly enough.

Relief courses through me along with the realization that not everyone in this classroom feels the same way Olive does. “Thank you,” I whisper as Irwin begins reading from the textbook.

“Sure. I’m Saskia, by the way.”

She turns to the correct page, and I scan the heading. Pardon for Those Who Committed Atrocities Under the Influence of the Mark. I try to focus as Irwin drones on, but I keep getting the feeling that people are watching me. Including the person whose textbook I’m trying so hard to concentrate on. I lift my gaze. A smile flashes across Saskia’s face before she returns her gaze quickly to the textbook. I look around and get the same reaction from several other trainees. Well, not the smile, but the hurried turning away of heads.

Focus, Calla. Read the text. Listen.

When Irwin reaches the end of the section, which was four very long pages, he gets a debate going back and forth across the classroom. There are strong opinions on both sides of the divide. Some agree that no one should have been held accountable for actions they had no control of during Lord Draven’s reign, while others believe there should have been some form of punishment for everyone who carried out his orders, even though they were ‘brainwashed’ at the time. I listen carefully, keep my head down, and hope I don’t get called upon to participate.

When the debate starts getting personal, with people shouting about the guilt and emotional turmoil their mother or brother or neighbor has to live with every day—“Surely that’s punishment enough!” a guy from the front row yells—Irwin brings it to a close. We’re told to report to the training center for the next three hours. After lunch we’ll be back here for another lesson with a different mentor.

Chatter rises, along with the scraping of chair legs against the floor. Saskia’s textbook slaps shut before scooting toward the edge of the desk and dropping neatly into her bag. I stand, feeling the stirring of nerves in my stomach again. Surviving a lesson was easy enough; now I have to survive three hours in the training center. Three hours that most likely involve one-on-one combat with someone from this room who wishes I wasn’t here.

Well, I suppose it’ll be like fighting a real opponent then.

Saskia stands and lifts her bag onto the desk. “You don’t look the way I imagined,” she says, tilting her head to the side and examining me.

“Oh.”

“I’ve never met anyone with actual gold in their hair.” She pulls her own hair over her shoulder and twists it around and around, the red and brown strands tangling together. “I suppose it’s just another thing that makes you different.”

Different. Yeah. Not something I want to be. “Um, thanks.” Her probing gaze makes me uncomfortable, but that bright smile is back on her face, so I figure I should take the opportunity to try and make a friend. “And thanks for coming to my rescue with the textbook.”

“Oh, sure, of course. Any excuse to sit next to you.” She leans closer and lowers her voice. “I wanted to be the first to ask you about the boy and the bicycle.”

“W-what?” A slow chill creeps up my spine. The boy and the bicycle. Incident Number Four.

“You know,” she says. “That boy at the healer school who suddenly started riding his bicycle in frantic, weird patterns because he was convinced he was riding through a maze with some terrifying creature chasing after him.”

I do know. I wish I didn’t, but I do. “That’s … not really …”

“My mom’s a healer, you see, so she heard about it from her friend who teaches at the school you were expelled from. She said your mom’s an Unseelie faerie who taught you dark magic so you could make that guy go crazy as punishment for teasing you. She said I have to stay away from you. I told her she was being ridiculous, of course, and that I’d find out the real story from you.”

“I don’t have Unseelie magic,” I say automatically. “Neither does my mother.”

“Oh, yeah, of course not. I mean, there’s no way the Guild Council would let you in here if you did. But everyone knows weird stuff happens around you. So I just want to know how you do it.”

I glance around. Irwin is gone, and only a few stragglers remain, quietly gathering their things. I resist the urge to hug my arms tightly around my middle. “I don’t do anything,” I say to Saskia.

“Come on, share your secret. Otherwise everyone’s going to think you do know dark magic.”

I step closer to her. “I don’t have a secret,” I say firmly, “and I don’t know any dark magic.”

She shrinks away from me as though in fear, but I can see a triumphant gleam in her crimson eyes, and I get the feeling this is the reaction she was aiming for all along. “So it’s true then. You do know dark, Unseelie magic, and the only reason the Council let you in here is because your brother’s now one of them so he can cover up your secrets.” She steps backward and raises her voice to add, “I guess we’ll have to stay away from you after all.”