by J. P. Larson
"What?"
"You have two months to figure it out, Eva."
"The Mobius strip?"
I nodded. "This is why Quartain won't tell us what we're doing this summer. She's going to make me take the adept exam."
She stared into my face then said quietly, "If you learn slowly, she'll call you on it."
"We might need a training accident," Loralai suggested. "I can accidently hit you upside the head, Kia. It would be a shame if I knocked this right out of your head again."
"Not funny," Eva said. "Okay, maybe a little funny."
"I don't think Quartain would believe me," I said. "We'd have to get someone else to do it."
We laughed nervously before stepping into the dormitory and climbing the stairs to our room. We climbed out of clothes, put everything away, and climbed back into bed. I lay back and said, "I'm going to sleep now." But above me, I built and absorbed Mobius strips.
"Show off," Eva muttered.
* * * *
In the morning, there was a note waiting for me.
"Quartain doesn't waste time," Eva said handing me the note. It had her seal, and I already had a pretty good idea what it was. I read it out loud.
"Congratulations, Kia," it began. "I remain so proud of you. All your other classes are cancelled. Report to Journeywoman 641 after breakfast. With all my love, Quartain."
"She's in a hurry," Eva observed.
"She did the same thing with Renala and then Vimie," I said. "I wonder what deal I can work with her."
"If she is inflexible, cut her some slack," Eva said.
"It could be months," I said. "I wasn't even trying. It just sort of happened. You saw. I didn't even notice. You had to. I wonder if I've been doing it for a while."
We didn't have any answers.
After breakfast, I climbed to the top of the Journeywoman tower and found room 641. The room was empty, so I made sure it was the right room then stepped in. I made my way to the training circle then lay down on my back on the stones, closed my eyes, and let my magic out.
I was still doing that ten minutes later when someone walked in. I recognized Quartain's tread, the peculiar clack of her heels against the stone. I didn't even open my eyes, but I extended my magic towards her until I felt it surround her.
"You are such a wonder, Kia," she said gently. "Do you know: yours is the only magic I've ever stood in, other than my own?"
"Make me an offer, Mother," I said.
"No offer. You will learn. When we decide you are ready, you will take your exam. And then you will go where the queen sends you."
"Nice opening," I replied. I still hadn't opened my eyes. I formed a Mobius strip embedded in my magic, then dispelled it.
Quartain took in a breath. "I'd rather you didn't do that last part while I am standing in your magic, Kia."
I opened my eyes. "Seriously?"
"Yes. It can go badly."
"I'm sorry."
"There was no damage this time. But a Mobius strip in a field of magic can turn, well, explosive."
I thought about it. "I didn't know that. Shouldn't I have learned that by now?"
"Perhaps."
"I'll agree to any plan that keeps Eva and me together," I said, "as long as she agrees, too."
Then I closed my eyes and swirled my magic around.
"You will do what you are told, and when Eva passes her adept exam, I will stress with the queen how important it is for the two of you to be posted together."
"Nice try," I said. "We both know I haven't cashed in my little 'I owe you' with Marie from three summers ago. I don't need you to fight that fight for me. I'll do it myself."
She moved closer and sat down beside me. "I can't postpone your adept exam indefinitely, Kia. You know that."
"What if Eva figures out the Mobius strip?"
"If Eva figures out the Mobius strip, then she'll be taking her adept exam two or three months later."
"You'll let me wait?"
"It won't kill you to be apart for a couple of months."
I opened my eyes. "Cancel her classes. Let her focus strictly on this."
"It won't work. Don't you think if we could force it, we'd have forced both of you a year ago? No one ever learns it by trying too hard. You either just get it, or you don't."
"Give me something, Quartain. You're not giving me anything at all. I'm not asking for much. You know she's just as close as I was. She could figure it out this afternoon."
"Or it might take her two more years."
"It won't, and you know it. Give me something."
"I have a house for you."
"What?"
"I have a house reserved for you. It's kitty-corner from Iladarta."
"The one with the tired landscaping no one is taking care of?"
"I keep waiting for you to do something about that."
"That's what we have grounds staff for," I said. "It needs pruning, and I wasn't going to ask Lunia to do someone else's pruning."
"Well, it's yours the day you pass your adept exam."
"I don't want a house, Mother. I want to be with Eva. Why are you offering me a house?"
"You told me to offer you something. I thought a house was a pretty nice offer."
"Are you suggesting you want me to become a teacher here at the school?"
She didn't respond.
"Are you?"
"What if I were?"
"I don't want to play that game, Quartain," I said irritably.
"Part time," she said. "Maybe. I haven't talked to Hallamarie about it. She's going to want you out and about."
"You don't need me," I said. "Unless Iladarta or Erin are leaving, there's nothing I can teach they don't already teach."
"Erin is misplaced here," Quartain replied. "She doesn't like it here and would leave if we didn't need her."
"You're offering me her place?"
"Part time initially. You need experience."
"What are you proposing?"
"Traveling healer and recruiter, and teach one term a year. You would also take apprentices or journeywomen with you."
"Recruiter. Like Adept Malla and Magus Erin?"
"Yes. Well, not exactly like them, but yes."
I thought about it. "Present an offer that keeps me with Eva and I'll agree."
"Once she becomes an adept, you can coordinate your circuit with her. We don't have anyone else doing this type of recruiting, and Ordeen is a big place. Most of the country goes years without seeing a single sorceress. I checked our records. Until Magus Erin and Adept Mallow showed up, there hadn't been a single sorceress to ever record a visit to Lamore's Holding."
"You don't have the authority to make this offer," I said. "That's the queen."
"I'll propose this."
"I thought you were training me to shadow Eva around as her cover story."
"She doesn't need a cover story. She could be a traveling charm vendor just as easily, Kia."
I closed my eyes and played with my magic some more. "I'm not impressed with your offer, Quartain. You're making offers you don't control, and the offers aren't as good as I can get negotiating with Hallamarie myself."
"You don't want to teach here?"
"You know, I think I could enjoy that, but I don't hear you offering a teaching position to Eva. Is teaching the best use of what I can do?"
"Perhaps not, but you'd be a better teacher than Erin, after a few years, anyway."
"Come on, Quartain. Make me a real offer."
"I can't make offers for the queen, Kia. You know that. Once you're ready for your adept exam, you're taking it. And once you pass, you're negotiating with her."
"I see." I said it curtly.
"What I can offer is this: for as long as either of you are based here, you may share a room. That either means your current room in the journeywomen tower or in the adept's house I have waiting for you. I'm sorry, Kia. I can't offer more than that."
"You can wait to declare me ready."
<
br /> "You know I won't."
I dropped my magic. I was getting frustrated, and I knew it would come out in the magic. I didn't want her feeling my frustration. I opened my eyes and sat up, turning to look at her.
"Are you being difficult because you've had dreams requiring you to rush me through this?"
"I'm not trying to be difficult. You're asking me to be dishonest, Kia. You're asking me to be dishonest to the queen. That's treason."
"You could let me choose which spells to learn first. If I don't learn the containment spell, I'm not ready."
"Kia, consider this. Are you asking me to deprive Ordeen of your healing ability for an additional year or two, if that's what Eva needs? How many lives could you make better during that year?"
"That's not fair!" I spat.
"It's a perfectly reasonable question. Don't get angry with me if you don't like uncomfortable questions."
I stood up and walked away, fuming a little.
"What about what I want?"
"You've told me for nine years you want to help people."
"Doesn't my happiness matter? Doesn't Eva's?"
"Of course they matter. Come over here, help me to my feet, look me in the eye, and tell me how many people you're going to let go without your help for the next two years."
"You fight dirty."
"How many babies will you save during those two years, Kia? How many poorly-healing legs will you save?"
"Shut up!" I screamed. But I walked over to her and pulled her to her feet. She didn't yell at me for my tone. "I'm sorry," I said.
"You're upset," she said. "You wouldn't be you if you didn't get upset from time to time. I know that. You're being calmer than I was expecting this to go."
"Why here instead of your office?"
"Because this conversation is going to last a few more minutes, then I'm going to begin teaching you how to prepare your first instantly ready spell."
"Not the shield?"
"I thought you'd appreciate this more. We can do the shield if you prefer."
"Whatever you think is best," I said. I looked at her pleadingly. "Please, Quartain. Give me something."
"I am, honey. I'm giving you as much as I can. I'm offering you a home, and I'm offering to use my considerable influence with the queen to keep you together as much as is reasonable. What more do you want?"
"You didn't have to cancel my other classes."
"They were busy work," she said.
"They were not!"
She smiled. "Okay, perhaps not, but they aren't critical. This is critical. The first thing Hallamarie is going to ask me is, 'How soon can she be ready?' and if my answer is more than 'three months', she's going to ask why so long."
"I'm negotiating with the wrong woman."
"Yes, partly. But the teaching offer is a real offer, Kia."
"Subject to Hallamarie's approval."
"Yes. But you wouldn't get that offer if I didn't make it. She doesn't assign teachers. She lets me make recommendations and approves them."
"I think I should be out in the world for a while." I took a breath. "If she learns to make a Mobius strip, will you support my negotiations with the queen to keep us together?"
"You'll be together, Kia. Not always, but much of the time. I don't know how much."
"That's not an answer."
"Kia, when you are ready, I want you out there helping people. You're ready. You've been ready for a long time. We've kept you here for this day and for these next two or three months. Then I want you out there helping people. Come back here for a few months. We'll teach you more. Then back out you go. And when Eva is an adept, she'll be doing the same thing."
"You didn't think she'd make magus."
"I didn't then. I do now. I was wrong. The Mobius strip is the last big step. The rest is time and focus."
I took a breath and nodded. "What do I do?"
"Make a light spell."
"You're going to have me make ready the light spell?"
"Probably not," she said. "You can only do this with so many spells. Eight is the standard for magus. One is the standard for adept. I have seventeen, and the last six took me eight years."
"Plan carefully?"
"It is difficult, but you can unlearn some. That's an enhancement skill, and you might need the queen's help."
"So why a light spell?"
"Because you need something to practice with. It's going to take weeks before you get this right."
I nodded, gestured, and a second later, a modest light spell hung between us. Quartain made one as well. Then she wrapped a Mobius strip around it. After that, she worked quickly, or so it seemed, but it took her a half hour to finish her spell. I stared at it.
"What happens if I poke that?"
"It's custom for me. If you poke it, it disintegrates and I have to do it again. You can imagine my reaction."
"Did you know it was going to take a half hour?"
"Yes." She grinned at me.
"You had me hold this spell for a half hour."
"Tired?"
"No."
"All right. Put a Mobius strip around it. And you have to form the Mobius strip around it. You can't move one that way, and you can't cast the light spell inside the Mobius strip."
So I made my Mobius strip, and it brushed against my light spell, disintegrating everything.
"Don't let them touch."
"Got it," I said.
I was drenched in sweat and ready for lunch before I finally did it.
"Good," Quartain said. "Work on that. Once you can do that smoothly, you're ready for the next step. You may want to clean up before lunch."
"Where do I go this afternoon?"
"Wherever you want to go to practice that. This space is available, but whatever works for you." She smiled. "I am your only teacher now, Kia, and this is the only thing we're working on."
"Will you show me what's next?"
"Only if you promise to focus on this first."
"Promise."
She assembled her own light spell and put the Mobius strip around it. "Now we need three connections from the center connection of the light spell outward like this." She slipped three pieces of magic into the center at the same time, connected the surrounding magic to the dead center of her light spell. "Not all spells have a center connection to reach, and those spells cannot be stored ready. And you have to make all three connections simultaneously. It took me three weeks, Kia. You'll be much faster."
"Why is that?"
"Your theatrical presentations have given you a great deal of experience doing multiple things with your magic at once."
I paused. "How long does this process typically take?"
"I was faster than average," she said with a smile. "From my first Mobius strip to passing my adept exam was fourteen months. I was twenty-four."
"And you think I'm going to finish in three?"
"Or sooner."
"And Eva?"
"Only a little longer than you." Eva and I did a magical theatrical performance together every few months, and she held her own now.
"Do not practice this part without me, Kia."
"Yes, Senior Magus Quartain."
"Go on."
* * * *
When I got back to the room, Eva was there. She took a look at me and stared. "You look so sexy right now," she said, "all sweaty, with your hair matted to your forehead."
"You are such a smart ass," I told her. "Why don't you play hooky from your classes and we'll go challenge each other to a magical duel."
She laughed. "Did someone learn a new spell?"
"If you win, I'll let you paddle my bottom."
"Oh, someone is getting cocky."
I laughed. "Naw. No new spell. I just knew you wouldn't skip classes."
"You better go shower."
"I'd rather do something else," I said, looking her up and down.
"Oh, look who is all playful." She pointed. "Go."
I showe
red quickly. When I got back, Eva was waiting for me with fresh clothes. She shoved me into them then braided my still wet hair. She lifted the braid out of the way and told me to get my boots on.
"Are we in a hurry?"
"The lunch bell was ten minutes ago."
As journeywomen, we weren't in trouble for being late, but if we were too late, there wouldn't be any food waiting for us. A missed meal wouldn't kill us, but magic used energy, and we were preternaturally small. Frequent meals kept the crabby moods away. And so we did a quick neatness check and headed for lunch.
* * * *
It took me until Fiveday before I could consistently create the Mobius strip around my light spell. I demonstrated for Quartain, and she immediately asked me to practice the same thing around my larger spells.
"Can this be used to produce a larger version of the light spell? If I pour more magic into it when I finally cast this, does that mean I have a larger version at the ready?"
"No," she said. "You'll decide the amount of magic to pour into it when you use it. One light spell will cover all sizes. Practice today and meet me in my classroom tomorrow morning."
"That was your classroom?"
She smiled. "You didn't think I had one?"
* * * *
Eva was spending all her free time attempting to create the Mobius strip, and she was becoming decidedly unhappy she wasn't having any success.
For the first time since we met, Eva became short tempered.
It came to a head on Sevenday three and a half weeks after I produced my first Mobius strip. I still hadn't produced my first spell using the Mobius strip, but I was making progress.
When I woke that morning, Eva was already trying to produce the Mobius strip. I cajoled her to breakfast, but when we got back, she was back to trying to produce the strip.
"Eva," I said, "Relax. It will come."
"Don't tell me what to do!" she snapped. She turned to me. I hadn't realized how tired she looked, but there were bags under her eyes and her eyes were red. "This all comes so easy for you. You were ahead of all of us from the day you arrived. But finally I'm ahead of you, at least on Sevenday, and it kills you. You think I don't know you hate it? You smile and ask me to kiss you, but you're just waiting to cast a shield I can't get through because it eats you alive I'm better than you at anything. I bet you're hoping I never learn this, that I remain a journeywoman for the rest of my life while you become an adept and then later a magus. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"
