Novel - Arcanum 101 (with Rosemary Edghill)

by Mercedes Lackey

  There was nothing she could do.

  Except one thing.

  Ms. Clifford spent a lot of time in her office outside of class hours. If kids were going to come to her with problems of their own that needed solving, they were more likely to do it on their own time—which meant during lunch or after class was over for the day. VeeVee wasn’t surprised to find her still here now, even though she’d spent about an hour just walking around the campus—unnoticeable—calming herself down before coming here.

  “VeeVee. What can I do for you this evening?” Ms. Clifford asked when she walked in. “Everything all right at home? I know you just got back from visiting your parents.”

  Soothing Celtic music was playing on the sound system; Ms. Clifford turned the volume down when VeeVee walked in. She sat down in the chair across from Ms. Clifford’s desk. The last time she’d sat in this chair, Ms. Clifford had asked her if she wanted to mentor a boy named Tomas Torres.

  “As right as it ever gets,” VeeVee answered. “Everything’s fine there.” Aside from the fact that someday Mom’s going to call, or Dad—or maybe one of their friends—and tell me somebody’s dead. But I’ve always known that. “Actually, I need to ask you to assign Lalage Chisolm as Tomas Torres’ Student Mentor. He’s made a great adjustment—as you know—and I don’t think we have anything to worry about. And I can’t work with him anymore. So if you’d make the change, that’d be great.”

  There was a long moment of silence.

  “Is this about you, or about him?” Ms. Clifford finally asked.

  VeeVee knew she was only doing her job, but it was still a hard question to answer. “It’s me, Ms. Clifford,” she said. “I’m the one who can’t deal. I think Lalage will make a great Student Mentor for him.”

  Ms. Clifford nodded, accepting VeeVee’s words at face value. “I’ll talk to both of them about it in the morning, then. VeeVee… I know you’re very strong—probably the strongest person I know—but nobody has to handle everything in their life alone, you know?”

  “I know, Ms. Clifford,” VeeVee said quietly. She was already getting to her feet. “This isn’t something anybody can help me with, though.”

  A few hours later she went back to her room. On the drive up here she’d been so happy, thinking that soon she’d be back at St. Rhia’s with the people who understood her (some of them) and who loved her (some of them, in different ways.) But she knew—because Mages had to be honest with themselves, first and foremost—that the person she’d most been looking forward to getting back to was Tomas. Who didn’t give a damn what she could do magically. Who didn’t even really believe in magic, despite what he’d seen in the last few weeks.

  As she walked down the hall to her room, she saw that Lalage’s door was open. It didn’t matter how bruised VeeVee’s heart was right now. It didn’t matter that she’d just resigned as Tomas’s Student Mentor. She still owed him all her care, even if her heart was breaking right now. She stopped and pushed the door open.

  Lalage was sitting on her bed, paging through a fashion magazine. Just as if she doesn’t care what happened tonight, VeeVee thought spitefully, and locked the thought down. Hard.

  Lalage looked up when she saw the door open. She looked alarmed when she saw VeeVee, then wary. “What do you want?” she asked. “Come to ask for him back? He doesn’t want you.”

  And I wonder whose idea that was, in just three days? Another thought she didn’t dare think. “No,” VeeVee said levelly. “I’ve just come to tell you something. If you break his heart, the first time you know I’ve found out about it will be when the fire alarm goes off in your room.”

  Her oaths be damned.

  Lalage’s jaw dropped in shock. She was still staring when VeeVee closed the door again and walked on to her room.

  On Tuesday morning, Chris grabbed Tomas on his way out of the dorm to tell him that Ms. Clifford wanted to see him some time that day.

  “No hurry. Anywhere between your classes is fine.”

  “Um…?” Tomas said.

  Chris shrugged. “I’m only the messenger.”

  As one of the Dorm Proctors—and a known night-owl besides—Chris got copied on all the e-mails to the students living in the dorm. Nothing confidential, of course, but a lot of the students didn’t check their e-mail before breakfast, and it was part of Chris’s job to check his. If your class schedule had been changed unexpectedly, or you had to see any of the school staff for any reason, Chris would catch you in the morning to tell you about it.

  Tomas didn’t see any reason to wait around, so he went over to the Main Building immediately to see if Ms. Clifford might already be there. But even though he could hear music coming from behind the door of her office, the door itself was firmly shut, meaning there was somebody already in there, and Tomas knew better than to interrupt.

  He went on to the Dining Hall, hoping that VeeVee would be at their usual table, but this morning not even Lalage was there. He guessed he needed to apologize to Lalage as well; by the time he’d stopped running around the campus checking every place VeeVee could have been last night—nobody’d even known she was back—Lalage had left his room. He’d really blown things bigtime—dropping one girl to go chasing off after another.

  Even if he didn’t want the girl he’d dropped and did want the girl he’d chased. Oh yeah. One poco se beso had been enough to tell him that. The moment he’d kissed Lalage he’d known it was a mistake. And it was too late then. Lalage was bastante, and nice, and muy caliente, but she wasn’t the girl for him.

  His attention wandered all through his morning classes—Mr. Balinsky kept calling on him, but Tomas simply wasn’t following the discussion; and in Algebra, a class he normally aced, he flubbed every question Ms. Mallozzi tossed at him. Fortunately, after the first few, she decided to ignore him completely for the rest of the hour. The only thing he had to be grateful for that morning was that third period this week was History instead of Chemistry—he’d probably have blown up the whole school. When it was over—last class before lunch—he went off to Ms. Clifford’s office again, and this time she was free.

  “Have a seat, Tomas. I’ve got some great news, and some news that could go either way. I’d like to know how you feel about it.”

  Tomas knew he looked suspicious, but people wanting to know how he felt about things had never been a good sign. “Could we start with the good news?” he asked.

  Ms. Clifford smiled. “Okay. This weekend your mother and your sister will be coming up to visit during the picnic. Since you’ve been here for two months, and you’ve been doing such a good job of settling in with us, we thought it would be a nice idea if they could come up to see how you were doing.”

  “Without asking me?” Tomas demanded.

  “This is one of the few times of the year St. Rhia’s is open to visitors,” Ms. Clifford said gently. “And your mother has been asking when she can see you. After she visits, you’ll be allowed to write to her whenever you like. You do need to make a decision though. Before you see them, really.”

  “What?” Tomas demanded. He knew he sounded sulky and hostile, but he was still reeling with the shock of the thought of seeing Mamacita and his little Rosalita again. One of the school rules had been that he wasn’t even allowed to write home, and it hadn’t even occurred to him until now that someone might be writing home about him, telling Mamacita how he was and how he was doing.

  “You need to decide just what you’re going to tell her about… who you are, and what you’re becoming. It’s not a decision we make for our students,” Ms. Clifford said. “All we’ve said in our weekly letters to her is that you were settling in well and doing well in your classes. And all of that’s true. But it’s not the whole truth. You need to decide just how much of that she can stand.”

  “None of it,” Tomas said instantly. Mamacita didn’t even like Rosalita’s invisible friends, and they weren’t real. How much worse would it be for her to find out that some people’s invisible friends
were? “She won’t—when she’s here—”

  “No.” Ms. Clifford shook her head. “Any unusual aspects of our festivities won’t start until well after dark, and any visiting parents will be off the campus by then. A number of our students who are in contact with their families prefer not to involve them in this part of their lives just yet.”

  Not ever, Tomas thought fervently.

  “All right. That’s settled then. She should be arriving around eleven on Saturday, she’ll get the tour of the school, she and Rosalita can stay for lunch, and then someone from the staff will drive her back into Tammerlane to catch the bus back into the City.”

  Tomas nodded. As he knew by now, Tammerlane was the nearest town to St. Rhia’s, a wide spot in the road about ten miles away. It had a Post Office and a bus station, but that was pretty much it. “Okay,” he said. “So… there were two things?”

  Ms. Carmichael actually seemed to hesitate for a moment before she spoke. “VeeVee has decided that Lalage would do a better job as your Student Mentor. I asked Lalage this morning if she thought she was capable of doing the job, and she said yes. So from now on, if you need anything—”

  “But I don’t want to change!”

  “I’m sorry, Tomas. It isn’t up to you. Unless you don’t think you can work with Lalage.”

  Tomas shook his head slowly. He didn’t want to tell Ms. Clifford that he couldn’t work with Lalage, because he didn’t want to tell Ms. Clifford why VeeVee had asked for the change. But how do I get VeeVee back? Oh, yeah, that was the real question. And he didn’t think Ms. Clifford could answer it.

  “I don’t want to pry, Tomas, but is there anything about this you’d like to talk about?”

  “No,” Tomas said, swallowing hard. “Nothing.”

  That was Tuesday.

  By Saturday morning Tomas was just about crazy. Oh, sure, VeeVee was here. Sometimes he even saw her at a distance—across the Dining Hall, on the other side of the campus, walking into the Girl’s Dorm, or into the Library. But after the first time he’d gone running after her and she’d just disappeared before he got anywhere near her, he had too much pride to try that again. He couldn’t get anywhere near her.

  He couldn’t make himself be happy with Lalage, either, even though once she would have been just what he wanted. It didn’t help either that all-of-a-sudden that Kurt Richards was glaring at him every time he turned around, and while he and Kurt had never exactly been buenos amigos, they’d gotten along okay until now. The last thing he needed was to start getting into fights. He tried to look forward to the good things: seeing his mother and sister again, telling them that he would never steal, never cheat, never hurt anyone again.

  Except he was going to be lying to both of them the whole time. Because Mamacita was going to ask him to swear not to tell lies—and he would—and ask him never to start another fire—and he’d promise her that, too. And the whole thing about not hurting people, well… were monsters people? What about Elves? What about all the things that lived in Underhill and might come out? Kurt and Sarita Healed people and Gordy could just hear what they were thinking and Chris could see the future (sort of) and Destiny built things, but when you came right down to it, when Tomas started tossing fireballs around, somebody was going to get hurt. And Mr. Bishop had said that there were all kinds of good and necessary ways to use his power, and Tomas was starting to believe that—especially after going to Underhill—but the fact remained that he was still going to be lying.

  He hated that, but there didn’t really seem to be any way around it. There was only one thing Mamacita would think if he told her the truth: that he was una bruja—a witch thatthatthat. And not the kind they had here, or even the kind on television, but the kind that dragged souls down to Hell.

  There wasn’t a dance this Friday because of the preparations for the picnic. It was just as well, because Tomas didn’t think he could have stood it. Lalage was already giving him some pretty odd looks, and as for refusing to dance with her—he’d danced with her every Friday for the past two months. It would look a little odd if he stopped now. But he felt so guilty….

  On Saturday the weather was bright and clear. Of course it was. The whole school was full of magicians, wasn’t it? Even though it was Saturday, most of the kids were up at their usual weekday time, too—the tables had to be moved out of the Dining Hall onto the lawn, and that was being done right after breakfast. If you didn’t want to eat breakfast standing, you had to hurry.

  When he headed past Chris’s door, he saw that it was not only closed, but there was a black curtain down over the window. He remembered he hadn’t seen Chris last night. Cautiously, he opened the door.

  The whole room was shrouded in black—well that was normal; Chris was a Goth—and Chris was lying on his bed, an arm thrown over his eyes.

  “Don’t turn on the light,” he said hoarsely.

  Tomas stepped inside and closed the door. “Hey, hombre, you all right?” It occurred to him that Chris was the one who called the School Nurse when someone was sick, but who called Nurse Irene if Chris was sick?

  “Fine,” Chris gasped. “I’m having a vision. Or, I’m going to. This is just the lead-in. Probably later today.”

  “Is there—?” Tomas asked uncertainly.

  Chris laughed shakily. “No. Nothing anybody can do. I used to pass out. Now I just wish I would. I’ll be okay in a few hours. I just need to lie around for a while. But… thanks for checking.”

  “See you later, then,” Tomas said.

  As he closed the door behind him, it occurred to him that there were lots worse things to be than a guy who could start fires by thinking about it.

  At about eleven o’clock, the maroon school van came slowly up the drive. Tomas was waiting anxiously out in front, flanked by Ms. Clifford and Mr. Bishop, and—to his secret horror, even Mr. Moonlight was there. Señora Davies was driving the van, and Tomas wondered nervously what she’d said to his mother.

  The van pulled up, and Consuelo Torres stepped out, followed by Rosalita. Even though it had only been two months, Tomas was sure that Rosalita was much taller than she’d been the last time he’d seen her—and he was sure she was wearing a new dress. She looked around for only a moment before she rushed past her mother and flung herself into his arms, chattering excitedly: she’d missed him—was he coming home—they’d had frozen carrots for dinner three times last week—she stayed with the neighbor down the hall after school now and she was okay, and she had three dogs, but when was he coming home?

  “Ah, not for a while yet, ‘Lita,” that Tomas said, hugging her tightly. “I’ve got lots to learn here. And when I do come home, I make a home for you and Mama, ay?”

  “I am most pleased to make your acquaintance, Señora Torres,” Mr. Moonlight said, stepping forward and extending his hand to Tomas’s mother. “And to congratulate you upon being the mother of a fine son. He is a great asset to St. Rhiannon’s, and we are fortunate to have him enrolled here.”

  Mrs. Torres took the proffered hand, and shook it, but Tomas could tell she really wasn’t buying it.

  “Èl es un gamberro,” she said softly, shaking her head.

  Tomas winced. To hear Mamacita call him a criminal hurt.

  Mr. Moonlight smiled. “While it is true that young Tomas did indeed have an unfortunate run-in with the law, may we not agree to look upon it as fortunate instead? For I am persuaded, even upon my short acquaintance with him, that such an adventure will never be repeated, and it has brought him here to us. May I present to you Ms. Clifford, our school counselor, and Mr. Bishop, one of Tomas’s teachers? Both agree that he shows great promise.”

  Suddenly Tomas realized that both of them were staring at Rosalita—and had been for the last several seconds. Mr. Bishop had been standing right next to Tomas when the van pulled up, but he’d actually moved away, going over to stand next to Señora Clifford.

  Both of them shook hands with Mrs. Torres, assuring her that yes, Tomas was a promis
ing student and an asset to the school, and to Tomas’s embarrassment, she began to cry.

  “I’d wanted—I’d hoped—” she said.

  “Mama?” Rosalita said, sounding worried.

  “Why don’t we go into my office for just a few minutes?” Señora Clifford said, taking her arm and walking her up the steps of the Main Building. “It must have been a very long bus ride from the city, and I’m sure you’d like a moment to rest.”

  Señora Clifford and Mrs. Torres walked into the building, and Mr. Moonlight followed them, seeming to feel that his work here was done, though Tomas doubted very much that he intended to actually join them.

  “She’s all right, isn’t she?” Rosalita asked anxiously. “Mamacita never cries. At least not where anyone can see her.”

  “She’s just been very worried about your brother for a very long time,” Mr. Bishop said encouragingly. “Hello. My name’s Daniel. I’d like to be your friend.” He held out his hand.

  “I have a lot of friends,” Rosalita said. She took his hand.

  Tomas was watching for it carefully, and so he saw the blank look of shock cross Daniel Bishop’s face, as if the man had grasped a live wire rather than a ten-year-old girl’s hand. But Rosalita didn’t seem to notice anything.

  Tomas glared at Mr. Bishop anyway. Mr. Bishop shook his head slightly, meeting Tomas’s gaze, his lips forming soundless words. Not now.

  Okay, Tomas could wait. For a while.

  “Come on,” Mr. Bishop said. “Let’s take a look around. Ms. Clifford and your mom will catch up.”