Michael gave a small nod, acknowledging his new friend’s words, and opened the book. He read quietly so that Pol could hear him but he wouldn’t be interrupting the game. It wasn’t long before the other boys had fallen silent and a short time later, they’d all turned away from the game and were watching and listening, intent on the story.
The misstep was corrected, thanks to Pol. Michael would try to be more careful. He wanted to belong. After all, this was his home now.
# # #
CHAPTER SIX
Jarlyth knew there were many good reasons why he shouldn’t wake up, but the one reason which kept dragging him toward agonizing consciousness seemed to outweigh all the rest. He just didn’t know what that reason was, and he wasn’t sure it would seem good enough once he did know.
He heard voices, but he couldn’t make out what they were saying. They came from a great distance—or they seemed to. From a great distance away and from under water.
But why would that be?
“Jarlyth?”
The voice was so familiar. He knew he should know who it belonged to.
“Jarlyth? Sweetheart? Please wake up.”
And why was he asleep? Shouldn’t he be doing something important aside from sleeping? Hadn’t he been sleeping for a long time? Much longer than he could justify, no matter how tired he might be.
“Lord Denara,” a new voice called to him. A young person’s voice. A girl’s. “You have to wake up,” she insisted. “He needs you.”
He. The word echoed in Jarlyth’s befuddled brain. He needs you. But who was he?
Time was meaningless. Had it been only moments or days or years since the last time he’d heard a voice?
“You have to wake up, Lord Denara,” the girl’s voice pleaded.
“Yes, dear. You must,” the first voice added this, very firmly. He wanted to obey this voice. It felt natural to obey.
Mother?
“No one can find him, Jarlyth. Nylan needs you.”
Nylan. He had to save Nylan.
Jarlyth Denara woke up.
#
Michael sat high up in the branches of one of the oldest trees in JhaPel’s large, somewhat overgrown West Courtyard, and worked on his latest art assignment while Cyra the cat lay sleeping on a nearby branch. Though it often seemed to rain constantly in Queen’s City, the past two days had been fine, and for once he didn’t have to worry about drops of water falling from leaves onto his sketchpad.
Nanna Tierna’s efforts had paid off and, after showing a few of Michael’s sketches around to various artistic acquaintances, her family had engaged the interest of Robyn Vaznel, an up-and-coming artist whose own patron was none other than the royal Duke of Reyahl. Magister Vaznel came to JhaPel once every quarter-moon for Michael’s lessons, making him the only child at the orphanage to have a private tutor of any sort.
Since Michael could also read and write, he’d been assigned to the small group of other orphans with similar skills for his lessons and had the hope of someday being apprenticed as a clerk instead of as some sort of manual laborer. Michael rather hoped he would be apprenticed to an artist, but knowing Abbess Ethene’s mistrust of such a profession as steady, he didn’t let himself hope too much.
He’d now been at JhaPel for more than two years, and his murky, confusing memories of his life before the orphanage mattered little to him anymore. He fit here in this place better than he could have imagined he would that first day, and he felt safe and happy, and, most importantly, he felt that, in spite of his special privileges and talents, his friends accepted him.
The one thing JhaPel held in short supply, however, was solitude, and Michael stole any he could find whenever an opportunity arose. As bad weather ruled Queen’s City much of the time, any day he was able to sit up in the tree enjoying a bit of this solitude was very precious indeed.
So it did not please him at all when the sounds of his fellow orphans playing far below in the courtyard swelled and resolved into something less pleasant. He’d only checked on things a short time before and all had been well, so he tried to ignore the noise. Cyra’s curiosity was roused, however, and she climbed down a branch or two to peer through the leaves at whatever was going on below.
She began making chit-chit sounds as if she were after a bird, her tail lashing. Her excitement spiked, sending a quick flash of what she saw into Michael’s mind, and he gave a small, irritated snort. Closing his sketchbook, he put it and his pencils safely into his pack, which hung beside him from yet another branch, leaving it behind to fetch later. He didn’t want to have it torn or stepped on if there was some sort of fight.
Climbing down a couple of lengths brought Michael to a place where he could see through the leaves and tell what was going on. Telyr, true to form, stood over the smallest and weakest of the younger boys who’d been using the tree as point base in one of their less rule-bound games of trimble. Michael had bowed out of his friends’ more cut-throat match on the excuse that he’d keep an eye on the little kids. The others stood around looking angry and scared as Telyr’s latest sidekick glared them all into helplessness. He was a big boy, too, and Michael could understand why they all were too frightened to try to help the victim.
“Why doesn’t he stay in his own courtyard?” Michael muttered to Cyra who’d followed him. JhaPel had five large, separate courtyards—two for the girls and three for the boys, all divided up amongst the different ages. The older boys below shouldn’t have been in this courtyard at all just as the boys and girls weren’t supposed to visit each other’s courtyards. These rules weren’t always followed, however, and Michael grinned at the memory of the last time he, Pol, and Jiin had broken the rule themselves.
Visiting the girls’ courtyard, however, was much more fun than picking on little kids, and Michael could only despise Telyr and his companion for choosing cruelty over flirtation...which made one more good reason to loathe Telyr.
Michael climbed down another length, gauging his position above Telyr who had his back to the tree. No one else had seen Michael yet, though he hadn’t expected them to. He’d noticed that no one ever seemed to look up and had perfected climbing to take advantage of this.
Taking a breath, Michael jumped. At the same time, he whistled the signal he and his friends had concocted. His hands smacked against the branch he’d been aiming for, and he grabbed it, scraping a bit of skin but swinging his legs forward full-force. He grinned at the perfection of his aim as both feet struck Telyr’s back, solid and hard enough to knock him forward and over. As the older boy toppled, Michael used the momentum of his swing to flip himself back up onto the branch.
Telyr’s sidekick looked startled and then angry in quick succession. He reached down to help Telyr stand while turning his murderous glare up into the tree at Michael.
Staring back with a cool hauteur, Michael flicked a glance at the little group of younger boys and ordered, “Go get a nanna,” before returning his attention to the bullies.
“Wait!” Telyr’s sidekick yelled, but the little boys had scattered.
“Nik you!” Telyr stepped forward, closer to the tree. A gap from a permanently-missing front tooth made his breath whistle a little. “We were just messing around! Why did you—?”
“Oh, come on Telyr,” Michael said, still cool. Michael had read Telyr’s own, pre-JhaPel history from the bully’s mind on his very first night at the orphanage—a night they both remembered with vivid, almost stinging clarity—and he did feel sorry for Telyr. No one should have to endure beatings and misery, especially when there was no way to fight back.
Thank Vail I have better control now. Though not perfect. Accidentally learning about everyone else’s hard times had helped him feel less alone with his mysterious, painful past, but it had been rough going while he’d struggled to figure out how not to overhear and feel with every touch.
He narrowed his eyes at Telyr in a very Mabbina-like expression of disapproval. “Making everyone else in the world feel terribl
e isn’t going to make you any happier.”
“It’s our turn for clean-up,” the other boy said, a sneer etched across his face as if drawn there. Michael’s fingers twitched, and he wanted to climb back up the tree and get his sketchbook.
“They’re going to make me do their chores, Michael!” their little victim exclaimed, outraged and dismayed at the same time.
“You should be embarrassed, Telyr.” Michael shook his head pityingly. “Isn’t it more trouble this way than if you just got along?” He leaned forward with reckless grace and perfect balance to drive home his point more inescapably. “You must be so tired.”
“Shut up!” Telyr growled. His tongue darted involuntarily to the place where the missing tooth should be, and Michael smiled nastily.
The other bully caught Telyr’s arm. “Come on, Tel. A nanna’ll be here any tic.”
“I’ll make you be quiet!” Telyr shrugged free of his friend’s grip and started up the tree trunk.
Pol ran up, followed immediately by Jiin, Ned, and Toma, who played on their trimble team, and grabbed with both hands onto the back of Telyr’s shirt. He yanked the older—but not much bigger—boy away from the tree, sending him stumbling back and into his companion.
“Get out of here, kiska trash!” Pol shouted.
The little boys returned at that moment, too, leading a very annoyed-looking Nanna Mabbina.
She stopped below the tree and glared around at all the boys collected there, her glare at last settling on Michael, still standing on a branch about three lengths above the ground.
Without a word, she caught Telyr by the ear, pinching hard enough to make him yell, and marched off. His sidekick scrambled along after, needing no orders to know he was meant to do so.
Pol sighed and gave the tree trunk a perfunctory kick. He peered up at Michael. “Are you going to come down, now?”
Ned herded the little boys back toward the safer, open area of the courtyard where the other older boys could help keep an eye on them. Michael sighed. “Let me get my stuff first.” He climbed nimbly up to grab his pack from its branch before returning to the lower branches. He leapt for the ground from a height that made the other boys gasp, but he landed without a stumble.
“Idiot,” Pol said and gave the back of Michael’s head a light slap, but there was no heat behind the word.
“Do you want him to go after you or something?” Jiin shook his head.
“He’s twice your size, Michael,” Toma agreed. “You wouldn’t win.”
Michael shrugged. “I might. After all, he’s just big. He isn’t a good fighter.”
“How do you know that?” Toma demanded.
Pol actually laughed, though usually, any thought of Telyr just made him rage. “Michael’s the one who knocked his tooth out.”
None of them expanded on this revelation. It was a part of their dorm’s secret history that Michael, on his very first night at JhaPel while he’d still been weak from his long illness, had beaten back Telyr’s first, and so far only, attempt at bullying him.
Only Pol knew a deeper part of the secret history which was that Telyr hadn’t been bullying Michael at all. He’d been hassling another, even younger boy. That boy’s fear had reached out and grabbed Michael, compelling him to throw himself into the middle of things just as Pol walked in to see why Michael hadn’t come back yet.
Telyr had landed a punch, but it had been a pallid thing, just enough to make Michael realize he was in a real fight. He still didn’t know where his body had learned what it did next, but he’d spun, his palm jutting out hard, catching Telyr’s chin and snapping his jaw shut so hard the sound echoed against the bathing-room’s walls. Without a pause, Michael had pivoted, throwing a fist into Telyr’s gut which dropped him to the floor, groaning and crying, blood pouring from his mouth.
Pol had grabbed Michael by the arm then and tried to yank him from the room, but Michael had pulled away and hurried to free the younger boy from his flusher-stall prison.
“Do not go alone next time,” Michael had told the younger boy once they were safe in the corridor, and that boy had nodded and fled and only Pol knew why he then tried to give Michael his dessert for the next several days.
Pol had dragged Michael back to their dorm room, growling, “Take your own nikking advice.”
Jiin, Ned, and Lee had taken one look at Michael and Pol’s expressions and had flown to the bathing-room to see what had happened, arriving in time to see Telyr, bloodied and still dazed, rinsing his mouth out in the basin.
Michael hadn’t wanted to make a fuss on his very first night at JhaPel, so they’d all agreed to let the matter drop. Pol had followed-up with the bully, however, letting him know their silence would last only as long as Telyr left them alone.
Michael grinned at Toma who looked as if he didn’t believe Pol’s assertion. “I can’t stand to see him pick on the little kids.”
“Well, don’t think Nanna Mabbina’s going to let you off for fighting,” Toma warned him.
Jiin rolled his eyes but Michael just smiled. “I’ll tell Abbess Ethene what happened. She’ll say I did the right thing.”
When Pol, Jiin and Michael were called into Abbess Ethene’s office an hour later, Michael was proven right. He recounted his side of the story and was enthusiastically backed-up by the two younger boys summoned to tell their part, both of whom kept shooting worshipful glances at Michael in spite of Nanna Mabbina’s disapproving glare.
Telyr sat slumped in the chair next to Michael, looking murderous.
Abbess Ethene sighed and leaned back, peering at the older boy over steepled fingers. “Why must you always cause trouble, my boy?” she asked. “We have given you so many chances.”
Nanna Mabbina gave a soft grunt of agreement. Telyr didn’t answer but stared at the toes of his boots.
“Well? What have you to say for yourself?” Mabbina demanded, and she gave his shoulder a hard shove.
“You can all go nik yourselves,” Telyr mumbled. The little boys’ eyes widened in shock at such language, and Michael only just kept himself from reacting the same way.
Mabbina clouted him across the back of the head, hard, but Abbess Ethene held up a staying hand. “Mabbina,” and she glanced at the gathered witnesses.
“You’re all excused, now,” Mabbina barked, but her hand rested on Telyr’s shoulder. He was not included in the blanket dismissal.
As soon as they were too far to be overheard, Pol whirled, his face alight, and said, “He’s going to be tossed out! They’re going to throw him in the streets!”
Michael’s happiness faded a bit at this. “But he’ll be kiska,” he said, and Jiin and Pol both frowned at him, annoyed that he’d suddenly sympathize with their enemy.
The little boys were too busy being thrilled they hadn’t gotten into trouble to pay attention to any of this, and they squeezed between Jiin and Pol and ran off down the corridor, yelling, “Thanks, Michael!” over their shoulders as they went.
“Always the nikking hero, aren’t you?” Pol said, exasperated.
Michael shrugged, trying to hide his smile and failing.
“The girls will be so impressed,” Jiin added. “Oh, Michael!” He affected a high-pitched, sing-song voice. “Tell us how you defeated the evil Telyr!”
“Yes, yes!” Pol tried to match Jiin’s pretend-girl voice. “Tell us all about how you pummeled him to bits!”
Michael regarded his friends with put-upon patience and was about to respond when the Sixth Prayer bell sounded. He sighed instead. “Fine. Now, I’m late, and now I will be yelled at.”
As he turned on his heel to head toward the main building where his art lessons took place, Pol called after him. “We’ll tell the girls for you, all right?”
#
His lesson went well, as all of his lessons so far had. Though Robyn Vaznel was a celebrated artist—already titled “Magister” at only twenty-four years old—he donated his time to give these lessons, and he seemed to think Michael
could be great one day.
Michael had to guess he meant it, though, since Magister Vaznel was one of the few people he’d met whose mind didn’t all but shout at him. Most of the other people who had what he thought of as shadowed minds were adults, too, and he wondered if most grown-ups did know how to keep their thoughts to themselves.
It would be nice.
But Vaznel even mentioned introducing Michael to his own mentor someday, so he had to truly believe Michael had talent. Michael didn’t really want to meet anyone as grand as the royal duke, but the man was very influential.
Even Nanna Mabbina couldn’t turn up her nose at my becoming an artist if he said I had the talent.
Feeling light and happy, he hurried back across the massive compound to his dorm room to drop off his pack before evening meal. Everyone he passed smiled at him, and he smiled back, unthinking. It wasn’t until Toma stopped him, a huge grin on his face, that he realized everyone knew.
“I can’t believe it!” Toma exclaimed. “I can’t believe you got rid of him!”
“He did it to himself.” Michael tried to deflect the credit. Or blame, depending on how you looked at someone getting tossed into the streets. “He swore at Abbess Ethene and Nanna Mabbina when they were trying to help him. I didn’t have anything to do with that.”
“Yeah,” Toma agreed, obviously not meaning it. “But you stood up to him and that’s why he was in trouble in the first place.”
This seemed to be the consensus, and a great roar of talking and clapping and shouts rose up when Michael entered the dining hall a bit later. This was the one place where everyone was allowed to be together, and several of the girls were crowded around the table when Michael arrived, tray in hand.
He smiled, easing his way past the visitors to his usual place beside Pol. The noise of emotions and thoughts and actual sound was so loud, his poor defenses were useless against the onslaught, so he mostly nodded and smiled at whatever was said and hoped he wasn’t agreeing to or approving of anything horrid.
Nella, a very pretty girl with bright gold hair whom all his friends admired, pitched her voice to be heard as if she were making a speech. “With Telyr gone, everything’s going to be so much better for all of us, and it’s all thanks to Michael!” And with that, she turned, threw her arms around his shoulders, pulled him around to face her, and kissed him right on the lips.
SanClare Black (The Prince of Sorrows) Page 9
