Heroes' Reward

by Moira J. Moore

  “Aye.”

  “Dunleavy, this is Shield Liam Murdoch,” said Saint-Gerard. “He has been instructing the casters for the past year or so.”

  So I’d been brought in to replace him? They’d put me in a position of insulting him? “I can’t do the cast he was just performing,” I told Saint-Gerard.

  “No doubt because you haven’t encountered it before,” said Murdoch. “You are the best, aren’t you?”

  “No.” I wasn’t the best. Why did so many assume I was? “If you want to maintain control of the lessons, I have no objection.” Really. None at all.

  “The council would, and ego has no place in such a serious situation.” He held out a hand. “Shield Liam Murdoch.”

  “My pleasure.” I shook his hand. “This is my Source, Shintaro Karish.”

  Taro and Murdoch exchanged brief pleasantries.

  “I’ll leave you to get acquainted,” said Saint-Gerard. “Liam, can I rely on you to help Dunleavy get settled with the others?”

  “Of course.”

  “Excellent. Taro, my boy, it’s time to meet your students.”

  After giving me a wink, Taro ambled off after Saint-Gerard, towards the Pairs. If he felt any apprehension, he didn’t show it. He wouldn’t be able to actually do anything, not without my being there to Shield him, but he could charm them all, and that would put them at their ease, ready them to accept him as their new instructor.

  “Will you be working with us, creating events?” I asked Murdoch.

  “I’m not Bonded.”

  Oh. How embarrassing. Without intending to, I’d made things awkward. “You’re young, yet.” I had a suspicion, though, that he was nearing the age where the Triple S would no longer expect him to attend Matchings, to ever bond at all.

  He shrugged. “I’m good at this. I can reconcile myself to that.”

  He seemed a calm sort. I enjoyed that trait. “I have no idea how to teach anyone how to do anything,” I blurted out.

  This brought on a slight smile. See? I wasn’t completely awful with people.

  “I do,” he said. “I’m happy to assist, if you wish.”

  “I do. Very much.”

  The group had gathered around us by then, everyone having ceased their casting.

  So, time to begin. “Fair day, everyone.” My voice was nice and steady. “I’m Shield Dunleavy Mallorough.”

  “We know who you are,” one woman interrupted sharply. “Does your acclaim mean you’re an excellent instructor, too?”

  “Not at all,” I responded mildly. “Which is why I’ll be relying on Shield Murdoch’s assistance.”

  “Then why doesn’t he keep teaching us? He’s been doing a great job so far.”

  “Because Professor Saint-Gerard believes she has something to add to our lessons,” said Murdoch. “If you disagree with him, I suggest you see him. I, for one, trust his judgment.”

  He waited for further objections, but he didn’t get any. I didn’t think the woman was convinced, but she seemed unwilling to press further. No one else spoke up either, though not all of them seemed pleased to see me.

  Time to move on and pretend I had some confidence. “Now that we have that out of the way, how about we start with names?” These were the names I would have to remember.

  Chapter Eight

  The next day I found myself standing in the largest library I’d ever seen. Even the Imperial library at Erstwhile wasn’t as grand. Certainly the Shield Academy didn’t have anything like it. I’d never even seen most of the books. I asked Murdoch,“Where did these come from?”

  “They were stored in the Shield Academy. After the Council House was built, they were moved here.”

  “But why have I never seen them?”

  “There are books we don’t necessarily want students to see,” Murdoch answered. “Especially these.” He laid his hand against a stack of shelves that had been set a little apart from the others in the tall, long room. “These are the volumes of spells we’ve accumulated over the past few centuries or so.”

  “Centuries? The Triple S has known about spells that long and didn’t tell any of us?”

  “You know pretending to cast is illegal. We couldn’t have anyone suspecting we were teaching the students criminal behaviour. That would alienate just about every kind of regular there is.”

  I supposed that could be true. “How did you get the books?”

  “For the most part, they were sent by Pairs whenever they came across them.” He raised an eyebrow at me. “Something you chose not to do, from what I’ve been told.”

  Why would I? No one had ever instructed me to do such a thing, or had even told me that magic existed. It had never occurred to me to send books to the Triple S, and if it had, I still wouldn’t have done so, given all of Taro’s warnings concerning the dangers of letting the council know I could do anything unusual.

  Under the advice of Risa, I had destroyed the first batch of casting books I’d accumulated. The second batch had belonged to Fiona and her tenants, which of course meant I didn’t have the right to take them without their permission. Besides, I’d wanted to study them myself.

  And, seriously, the Triple S should have told me about casting before I’d left the Academy. Why hadn’t they? “Does anyone read them now?”

  “Only those we can trust to act with sufficient maturity and caution. We don’t want anyone reading them and attempting casts they’ve not yet received instruction for.”

  The books were huge in their variety. Some were thick tomes, others were little more than pamphlets. Some were old, some newly printed. And then there were the hard black volumes with covers of a material I had seen only once before, with paper that bent without creasing, in a language I couldn’t really understand.

  “Zaire,” I breathed, lightly touching the spine of one of those strange books. “These are from the First Landed.”

  Those adventurers who had come to our world with grand machines that could fly and send words across great distances and accomplish all sorts of other activites most of us couldn’t imagine. And since I’d left the Academy, I’d learned it was believed by some that they had brought casting with them as well. But their machines had failed, and so had their magic, and those who were able to leave deserted those who couldn’t: my distant ancestors stuck with a world of unceasing and vicious disasters, barely surviving until the world created the first Source and Shield.

  “Can you read these?” I asked.

  “No, we haven’t found anyone able and willing to translate them.”

  “Academic Alex Reid – ”

  “Is dead. He was attacked and killed by robbers.”

  He’d been such a smart man, friendly man. Quiet, but with a strong will, and honourable. I hadn’t known him well or long, but I was sad to hear the news of his death.

  Murdoch pulled out a book and offered it to me. “I found this helpful, to begin with.”

  I was happy to get all of the advice I could. “I appreciate it.”

  “Shall we sit? I thought I might tell you how I deliver my lessons, if that isn’t too presumptuous.”

  “I’d like that. Thank you.”

  Murdoch spent most of an hour giving me what sounded like excellent guidance for teaching others. Like Browne, he believed in starting each class with simple casts, to get everyone thinking in the right direction. He was able to give me suggestions about how to handle a large number of students – there were slightly over forty – having them work in pairs and small groups. He also had a little to say on managing pride, disappointment, and impatience.

  And then Taro strode in. “There you are.”

  I felt a little lump of tension curl between my shoulder blades. Taro sometimes had strange ideas about what it meant when I spent a significant amount of time with other men. Not all men, just those who appeared particularly intelligent. I didn’t think he felt possessive or jealous, just … a little irritated? Maybe?

  “What are you talking about so
intently?”

  The evening before, Taro and I had exchanged information about our students and our impressions of the Arena. We had briefly spoken about Murdoch and Taro had shown no particular reaction at the time. I didn’t know why he was then. “He’s preventing me from making a fool of myself in front of my students.”

  “That’s advice I could use. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.”

  Ah, but Taro had natural charisma and beauty assisting him. That could take a person far, even with strangers in an unfamiliar situation.

  “I would be happy to,” said Murdoch. “But not right now, I’m afraid. I have to see Saint-Gerard. He wants a detailed report.”

  “About what I did yesterday?” I asked.

  “Aye.”

  So soon? I’d had less than a day with them.

  Taro watched him leave. “He’s a handsome fellow.”

  I didn’t think so, but Taro had always had a broader range of what he considered beautiful. That wasn’t the significant element of his comment, though. The tension between my shoulder blades grew denser. “Taro,” I said with resignation.

  “What? I can look, can’t I?” And he winked.

  And just like that, the tension flowed out of me. I sometimes forgot he’d changed, a little.

  Relief made me grin. “Of course you can look.”

  He gestured at the door with his head. “I’m thinking it’s time to show the other Pairs how it’s done. I’ve gone as I can on my own.”

  Taro and I hadn’t been able to work together with the Pairs the day before, on account of a sudden shower of harsh rain.

  The Pairs were waiting for us in the field. They were all staring into space, the usual stance of Pairs channelling. Sources and Shields could speak and even move about while channelling, but we didn’t like to do it.

  The Pairs were arranged in quartets, facing each other in a sort of stand off. Confrontational.

  This was all so wrong.

  Taro cleared his throat, and one by one, each Pair withdrew from their channelling.

  “Good day, ladies and gentlemen,” Taro greeted them pleasantly. “How are all of you doing?”

  I glanced about, trying to read everyone’s mood. There were those who seemed relieved to be able to stop, those who looked tired, and those who appeared irritated.

  “Frustrated,” one woman confessed.

  She looked familiar.

  Taro grinned at her. “No worries. It’s early days, yet. Lee, my love.” He presented the woman with a low wave of his hand. “This is Source Katherine Devereaux.”

  Oh my. That sent the memory of where I’d seen her before jolting into my mind. She had been at my Matching. She had been the Source I’d wanted, because she had had the reputation of being smart and sensible. Then she had Bonded with someone else – Shield Joshin Clothier, if I recalled correctly – and I had Bonded to Taro, and it hadn’t taken long for me to forget about her.

  I spent about an instant wondering what my life would have been like with her. I wouldn’t have been sent to one of the hottest sites in the world, she wouldn’t have been abducted, I wouldn’t have had to kill anyone to get her back. I wouldn’t have had to experience all the difficult and terrifying events that had followed after.

  I probably would have never met the Dowager Duchess of Westsea, Taro’s mother and a dark-hearted, evil woman. That was something that would have made my life a whole lot less aggravating.

  On the other hand, I wouldn’t have known that Sources could do more than channel events. That was knowledge I liked having.

  I probably would have never realised I could cast.

  I would have remained ignorant of how regulars lived.

  And I wouldn’t have fallen in love with my Source, and that would have been a shame.

  A man walked up behind Devereaux. “The Shield you actually wanted,” he said.

  Huh. Interesting. Devereaux had wanted me in particular. That we didn’t end up Bonding despite each being the other’s preference was just one of the little quirks of nature.

  For a moment, I wondered if Clothier felt resentment over not being Devereaux’s first choice.

  Then he nudged Devereaux with his shoulder, and she nudged him back. It seemed to me that if there had been any initial tension between them, they’d moved past it.

  “All right,” Taro said once all of the introductions had been made. “We’re going to pick up where Shield Merrin and Source Arlif left off.”

  Merrin and Arlif had been the former instructors of the group. Taro had told me the night before that, unlike Murdoch, they’d been replaced because they weren’t very good at it, not because the scope of their knowledge had been exhausted.

  They did resent being replaced. I could see the hostility simmering in their eyes. I wondered if they would be a problem.

  “For now, Shield Mallorough and I are going to focus on the Pairs who are not yet able to create events and leave those who can to practise on their own. I hope I’m not embarrassing anyone, but now that Shield Mallorough is here I can better assess your difficulties and then help you get to the same level as the others. Then we can all proceed together.”

  Some people looked down at their feet and scuffed the ground with their toes.

  It must be so difficult to be the weakest in any group of people.

  The students broke into two units. I was impressed by how easily the weaker students admitted they needed more help. The Pairs that were able immediately returned to duelling. Those who didn’t remained gathered around Taro and me.

  “Source Secondfin, Shield Glosect, we’ll begin with you.”

  Secondfin was an enormous red headed man. Glosect was a very short, dark, slight fellow. An appealling demonstration of opposites.

  “Give us a cyclone,” Taro said. “Don’t worry about making it strong. Just try to make some wind move.”

  I watched their eyes and faces grow blank.

  Nothing happened. Taro gave them enough time to provide them with a fair chance to succeed but not so much that he made a spectacle of them and humiliated them. Still, they didn’t succeed.

  They appeared to feel humiliated anyway.

  “All right,” said Taro. “Shield Rackey, Source Tweece, you’re next.”

  He tested each Pair in this way. Then, he performed a small cyclone himself, just to show them how it was done. Then he tested them all again.

  Taro had confessed to me that he didn’t really have a firm idea how to teach them. He had no one handy like Murdoch to give him guidance. Taro himself had learned to create events merely by observing another Source, not through deliberate instruction.

  If any of his students suspected he didn’t know what he was doing, they didn’t express it in any way. Not even Merrin and Arlif.

  Taro wouldn’t let them stop until the supper bell rang. They were all exhausted by then, and I wondered if Merrin and Arlif hadn’t pushed them as hard as they should have during their lessons.

  As in the Academies, meals in the Arena were served in a large dining room, everyone helping themselves to the food presented on long tables on the right side of the room. However, there were far more people than would normally be in an Academy at any given time. Runners, Guards, Pairs and casters were all crammed in together.

  They all sat with their own, with very little mingling.

  I didn’t know much – anything – about getting a large group of people to work together for a common goal, but surely segregation wasn’t the way to do it.

  “Let’s find Risa,” I said right into Taro’s ear, as the noise was incredible. He nodded, and we headed for the tables on the far left of the room, where I thought everyone were Runners. Once we were among them, I found Risa at the end of one of the tables.

  Taro and I carried our trays over, and I tapped her shoulder.

  She looked surprised but pleased to see us. “I thought you might stick with that lot.” She nodded at the tables closest to the food, where all the residents w
ith braids were sitting.

  “We see that lot all damn day,” Taro complained. “I haven’t been so inundated by Triple S members since I left the Academy. I didn’t miss it.”

  “Can we sit with you?” I asked. Maybe Risa would prefer not to associate with us before her peers.

  “Mado, Aiguo, shift yourselves,” she ordered.

  There wasn’t really a lot of room to shift, but Mado and Aiguo rolled their eyes and squished into their neighbours, who squished into their neighbours, until there was just enough space for Taro and I to squeeze onto the end of the benches on either side of the table.

  “Well,” said a woman a few people down, staring at Taro. “You’re a handsome fellow.”

  “Yes,” Taro answered easily.

  The woman appeared caught between amusement and disapproval. “And modest, too.”

  “Would you have thought me sincere if I’d disagreed with you?”

  “Well, no.”

  “Sincerity is an admirable trait, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Hm.” She didn’t appear convinced.

  “So are you two really lovers?” a young man interrupted.

  People were going to talk about that so much, and it was going to be so aggravating. Perhaps we should just wear signs. Yes, we sleep together. Yes, we know it’s perverted and careless. No, we don’t want to talk about it.

  “Do you really not know?” Taro asked. “Or were you just wanting to open the subject for discussion?”

  He flushed a little. “Um ….”

  “Who are you having sex with?” Taro demanded.

  We asked that a lot, to remind our inquisitors they were being rude.

  This time it didn’t work. “Inez,” he answered, gesturing at the woman beside him. “And Bingwen.” He gestured at the man across the table from him.

  “We are not!” Inez objected.

  The man’s eyebrows rose. “We slept together last night.”

  “Aye, but that was the last time.”

  “Again?”

  And they were off, everyone around our end of the table talking about who they were sleeping with, who they had slept with, and whether their partners were any good at it.

  I was getting a lot of information I didn’t need or want, but at least they weren’t talking about Taro or me anymore, so I could deal with that.