Work Experience (Schooled in Magic Book 4)

by Christopher Nuttall

  “Set up the cauldron,” Lady Barb ordered, when she returned. “I agreed to provide them with pain-relief potions, ones using Whitehall’s specific recipe.”

  Emily blinked in surprise. She’d never heard of a specific recipe from Whitehall. As far as she knew, the potions were fairly commonplace – and even if they’d started out unique, someone would have analyzed and duplicated them by now. But she pushed the thought aside and dutifully unloaded the small cauldron from Lady Barb’s bag, followed by a small handful of ingredients. Painkiller potion was fairly easy to brew.

  She lit a small fire, carefully placed the cauldron over the heat and filled it with water. Jasmine sat down next to her and watched, saying nothing, as the water slowly started to bubble. A handful of young boys came up too, but walked away disappointed when they discovered that Emily wasn’t using toad’s eyes, fish eggs or anything else equally gross. Emily had to smile at their reactions; normally, she passionately disliked cutting up small animals and insects. No wonder, she decided, most alchemists were male.

  Once the potion was cooling, she sat back and studied the Traveller family, trying to work out who was who. In Zangaria, it would be blindingly obvious who was in charge – and their sons and daughters would wear their colors. Here, with everyone wearing simple ragged clothing and little in the way of jewelery, it was hard to tell. Everyone adult either looked young, not much older than Emily herself, or old enough to pass for her grandparents. She wasn’t even sure who were the mothers and fathers of the dozens of kids running around the encampment.

  “They don’t take blood relations as being all-important,” Lady Barb explained, when she returned from speaking with the older Travellers. “A child born to a Traveller family will have at least five or six mothers and fathers, no matter who actually sired the child or gave birth to him. It’s a loving environment, but it can be a little stifling at times.”

  Emily wasn’t so sure about that. The children were running wild, despite shouts from an older girl who seemed to be their designated nursemaid. There was a look on her face of quiet desperation, reminding Emily of Imaiqah as she’d been on the first day she and Emily had met. The older girl eventually dragged two of the boys back to the fire and plunked them down in front of a stern-looking elder man. Emily couldn’t help noticing that the man winked at the boys as soon as the girl’s back was turned.

  The Traveller adults seemed surprisingly varied. Half of the adults looked as though they’d grown up in Germany, complete with blond hair and blue eyes that would have made Hitler proud, the remainder being a strange mixture of ethnic groups. She saw a young woman who looked Chinese, a man with black skin and an older woman who might have been Indian, although her skin was so wrinkled it was hard to be sure. The children seemed to be mixed race, like many of the magical families. Emily reminded herself that racism – at least among normal humans – was largely unknown among the families. They found it more useful to combine genetic heritages from all over the globe.

  And then they take it out on werewolves and gorgons, she thought, cynically. What’s the point of discriminating against humans when there are non-humans about?

  “You must have found it hard to adapt,” Emily said, looking up at Lady Barb. “How did they treat you?”

  “I did,” Lady Barb said. Her lips quirked with hidden amusement. “My father wasn’t quite as bad as King Randor when it came to spoiling his daughter, but I was the apple of his eye. I was not always a very well behaved child. My mother...was not amused.”

  She leaned over and checked the potion, carefully. “Good work,” she said, finally. “Let it finish cooling, then they can drain it into bottles for themselves.”

  Emily felt a flush of pride. She’d never really been praised by her mother, and her stepfather would sooner have joined his wife in a bottle than offer an encouraging word. And there was no point to praise at school, not on Earth. She’d known all too well that it was utterly pointless to work hard. But Lady Barb’s praise meant something to her. She wasn’t someone who gave praise easily.

  “Thank you,” she said. “What are we going to do now?”

  “It doesn’t look like rain,” Lady Barb said, looking up at the darkening sky. High overhead, the stars were starting to glimmer into existence. “Fetch the blankets from the wagon and we’ll sleep under the stars.”

  Emily nodded, just as a young boy ran up to them, carrying two bowls of stew and a pair of spoons. Lady Barb took them, smiled at the boy and passed one of the bowls to Emily. Emily sniffed it, decided it smelled good, and took one of the spoons. She was careful not to ask what went into the stew, knowing that it might put her off eating it. She’d watched the sergeants make food from ingredients they’d scrounged from the surrounding countryside more than once and it never failed to bother her. But she was the only person at Whitehall who would be bothered.

  Jasmine walked off, back towards the fire. Moments later, Emily heard her voice drifting back as she started to sing. She felt a shiver of envy – on Earth, Jasmine would probably have had the talent to escape being born in poverty – before realizing that she was being silly. Talent and fame didn’t always go together. But then, she’d never shared the music tastes of the other girls on Earth. She’d never really had an opportunity to develop tastes at all.

  She looked over at Lady Barb. “Jasmine should go to Whitehall,” she said, seriously. “Can I sponsor her?”

  Lady Barb frowned. “You’d need to speak with her uncles,” she said, after a moment’s thought. She smiled, but it didn’t quite touch her eyes. “Do you even know the girl well enough to make such an offer?”

  Emily scowled. Lady Barb was right. She barely knew Jasmine...and she was considering making a fairly sizable financial commitment to the young girl’s education. But there was something about Jasmine that reminded Emily of herself, a girl caught in a family situation she couldn’t escape on her own. Emily hadn’t escaped on her own. Shadye had kidnapped her, stealing her from Earth. If he hadn’t tried to kill her immediately afterwards, Emily suspected that he wouldn’t have had any problems turning her to the darkness.

  “But it isn’t uncommon,” Lady Barb added, softly. “You do realize that you’d be creating a permanent tie between you and her?”

  “I think so,” Emily said. The richer magical families often sponsored new magicians – or magicians from poorer magical bloodlines – in exchange for later favors. Imaiqah’s fees had been paid by Whitehall’s fund for new magicians, but several others she knew were committed to their sponsors. Some of them would probably wind up marrying into the magical families, adding their wild magic to the family’s genetics. “But I wouldn’t want much from her.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” Lady Barb said, dryly. There was a long pause as she looked up at the stars, then over at the gathering Travellers. “If you wish, I will speak with her current guardians on your behalf. Maybe, in fact, I will not mention that you wish to do it. But they may well say no. The Travellers dislike obligation to anyone outside their families.”

  Emily understood. One of the traditions at Whitehall that puzzled her, then alarmed her, was that obligations had to be repaid, somehow. Outside very close friends, there was no such thing as holiday presents. Every gift had to be repaid in kind with something of equal value. The dresses Alassa’s mother kept sending Emily, Alassa had explained, created a tie between Emily and Queen Marlena, even though Emily hadn’t wanted to create the tie herself. Or, for that matter, wear the dresses. But it was hard to refuse without permanently damaging their relationship.

  It was easy, she knew, for someone to be pushed into a subordinate position. A richer or better-connected student could create an obligation to a poorer student, simply by giving him or her expensive gifts. Whitehall’s rules on relationships made sense in that light, she knew; an older student could easily take advantage of a younger student. But the rules only seemed to push the practice underground. If Emily hadn’t been close friends with Alassa, she sus
pected she would have been drowned in expensive gifts.

  “I repaid my own fees,” Emily said, finally. “I’m sure Jasmine could do the same.”

  Lady Barb snorted. “I rather doubt it,” she said. “You were very lucky.”

  Emily nodded. She wasn’t quite sure who had actually paid her fees – Mistress Irene hadn’t been very clear on the matter when Emily had asked – but she’d returned the money anyway, once she was sure she could support herself. Neither the Grandmaster nor Void had ever commented on it. She suspected – she hoped – that meant they approved.

  “I will speak to her guardians,” Lady Barb said, again. “It will be a year or two before she can go to Whitehall in any case. She isn’t that old and her powers have yet to develop properly.”

  She smiled, suddenly. “The Travellers hold the record for the greatest number of child magicians,” she added. “They’re so frequently exposed to wild magic that their powers often develop earlier than their parents might wish.”

  Emily shuddered. Students at Whitehall could be cruel – but children could be crueler. The thought of a young boy or girl armed with magic was horrifying, particularly as they wouldn’t be in an environment where their use of magic could be monitored and supervised. And she’d read horror stories about what happened to such magicians when they finally went through puberty. Quite a few of them didn’t survive the experience.

  “I’ll go speak to them once the entertainment is over,” Lady Barb added, sitting up. “Go fetch the blankets, then you can get some sleep.”

  Emily obeyed, scrambling back into the wagon and finding the blankets on the cramped bunks. She couldn’t help feeling a little wistful as she jumped back down, watching the Travellers gather around the fire. An older man played a violin, several of the young couples danced...they were a family, no matter how strange, and had an easy companionship that she’d never known. Their children grew up knowing there were people looking out for them at all times. Even if they chafed sometimes under the restrictions, they also knew they were safe.

  She felt a tinge of envy as she laid out the blankets, one by one. It would be nice to share such companionship, but she wasn’t even sure where to begin. She liked her handful of friends, yet she wasn’t always sure how to handle being friends with anyone. There were times she just wanted to be alone, in the company of her own thoughts...she shook her head, bitterly. She’d never really had friends – or respected mentors – until she’d come to Whitehall.

  It was far too dark to read – she half-wished for a Kindle, although she had no idea if it would even work – so she lay back on the blankets and stared up at the stars. She’d never paid much attention to them on Earth, not when she knew she would never be able to reach orbit, let alone the moon or Mars. Now, she knew how to use them to find her way, thanks to the sergeants, but she had no idea if they were the same stars as those visible on Earth. If they were different, she asked herself, what were the implications of that?

  She tensed as she felt someone moving next to her, then relaxed slightly as she realized it was only Jasmine. The younger girl lay down on the blankets and closed her eyes, seemingly unaware of just how badly she’d alarmed Emily. Emily sighed, waiting for her heart to stop pounding in her chest. It had taken months for her to get used to the concept of having roommates, people who slept in the same room. And now, Jasmine had casually disturbed her...

  The entertainment had come to an end, she realized. She looked around and saw Lady Barb, her long blonde hair glistening in the firelight, talking to an older man. It was hard to believe that he was related to Jasmine; where Jasmine was pale, he was dark. But there were so many ethnic groups mixed in the community that it was quite possible he was related to Jasmine’s father. Emily watched for a long moment and then settled back on her blankets and closed her eyes.

  “I liked watching you brew,” Jasmine confided. “What were you making?”

  Emily smiled. “Green,” she said, without opening her eyes. “A nugget of the purest green.”

  The next thing she knew was a shock as cold water splashed over her face. She jerked awake as water cascaded down her shirt, looking around in shock. No one at Whitehall would have disturbed her sleep, certainly not during the run-up to exams. They needed their sleep just as much. But now...she sat up, choking, and saw two boys running away. The sun was inching its way into the sky, casting brilliant rays of light over the land.

  “Little brats,” Lady Barb swore. She lifted her hand and cast a spell after the boys, just as they dodged behind a wagon. Emily sensed a flare of magic and knew that the spell had reached its targets, even though they were out of eyeshot. If she’d had any doubts about Lady Barb being a powerful magician, that would have erased them. She smiled to herself at the sound of outraged croaking. “I’m sorry about that, Millie.”

  It took Emily a moment to remember that she was Millie. “It’s okay,” she said, although it wasn’t. Her clothes were not only drenched, they were clinging to her skin in a manner she found uncomfortably revealing. “Let me dry myself.”

  It took three tries before she managed the spell properly. Her hair still felt damp afterwards, but at least she no longer had water dripping down her body. Lady Barb stood up, dried herself and stalked off towards where the boys had tried to hide. Emily wondered what she’d done to them, hoping it was something truly unpleasant. Beating someone halfway to death didn’t seem like enough, somehow. She helped Jasmine to her feet, then cast another drying spell for the younger girl. Jasmine didn’t seem too upset by the whole experience.

  “They’re always like that,” she said, as Emily ran her fingers through her hair. “You get used to it.”

  Lady Barb reappeared, dragging both boys by their ears. They both looked rather shell-shocked, neither of them fighting or trying to escape. Lady Barb dragged them over to the adults, then had a terse conversation. Emily checked on the potion and discovered to her relief that it was unharmed, then started to move it into the bottles for storage. She’d had to clean the cauldron before they packed up for the day.

  “I’m sorry about that,” Lady Barb repeated, as she walked back to the wagon. “They’re going to be punished.”

  “Thank you,” Emily said, feeling an odd surge of vindictiveness. There had been times when she’d wished she had siblings, but she wouldn’t have wanted to expose anyone else to her stepfather. Besides, she liked being alone and it was hard to be alone when surrounded by family. “When are we leaving?”

  Lady Barb nodded towards the mountains. “We’ll be there in a couple of hours, once we depart,” she said. “And then we’ll be on our own.”

  Emily allowed herself to look forward to it as they ate breakfast, then packed up the campsite and buried their waste. Neither of the boys reappeared from their wagon, perhaps fortunately. Emily couldn’t help feeling murderous towards them, even though they probably hadn’t meant to scare her. But it wouldn’t be easy for her to sleep again in the campsite.

  “Set up wards,” Lady Barb advised, when Emily asked for advice. “You can hold one in place long enough to get some sleep, can’t you?”

  Emily scowled, irritated at herself. She didn’t use protective wards at Whitehall, nor had she used them in Zangaria or at Lady Barb’s home. But she could have used them at the campsite to ensure that her sleep was undisturbed, at least by children. Lady Barb wouldn’t have any difficulty waking her if necessary.

  “I can,” she agreed, sourly. She dried the blankets, then returned them to the wagon. “What did...”

  She nodded towards Jasmine. “They said we could provide the money, provided the obligations were all on her,” Lady Barb said. “It sounds cold, but it isn’t uncommon.”

  Emily hesitated, looking at the younger girl.

  “I’ll talk to her,” Lady Barb said, as the Travellers started to hitch the wagons to the horses. “If she accepts...you can talk to her later.”

  “I understand,” Emily said, reluctantly. She knew Lady Barb kne
w more about the whole system than her, but it still annoyed her. “I’ll let you handle it.”

  Lady Barb gave her a long look, then nodded.

  Chapter Twelve

  EMILY HAD NEVER SEEN MOUNTAINS IN person until she’d been kidnapped by Shadye. Since then, she’d seen the mountains that surrounded Whitehall and explored them with Jade, but the Cairngorms were different. She couldn’t help staring as the mountains grew closer, reaching up towards the sky, their peaks lost in dark clouds that flickered with lightning – and perhaps magic. The countryside changed too; trees clung closer and closer to the road, casting dark shadows over the wagons. Emily shivered as she peered into the forest, wondering what might be lurking inside. She’d read enough to know that anything could be waiting for them in the darkness.

  The convoy lurched to a halt. “Here we are,” Lady Barb said, as she passed the reins to Jasmine. “That’s where we’re going.”

  Emily followed her pointing finger. The trees parted, just enough to reveal a rocky path leading up into the mountains. Emily shivered when she saw the shadows moving ahead of them, then pushed the thought aside and picked up her bag. Lady Barb exchanged a few brief words with Jasmine before she jumped down and headed to the lead wagon. Emily said goodbye, biting her tongue to keep from asking Jasmine what she’d said to Lady Barb, then jumped down herself. Up close, the path didn’t look any more inviting.

  A cold wind blew through the trees as Lady Barb came to join her, the horses neighing in farewell as the convoy started to move out. Emily waved to Jasmine as the last wagon moved past, then drove down the road and vanished in the distance. She couldn’t help missing the convoy, now they were alone. It seemed impossible to believe that there were any other humans nearby. She would almost sooner be somewhere – anywhere – else.