“And you are?”
James looked up at him, staring at Havash for a moment. “I’m James Ogilvy. I’m in your theory of alchemy class.”
“Ogilvy. I believe I know your parents. Your father, at least.”
James paled slightly.
“You believe you know better? It wouldn’t surprise me. Your father always believed he knew better, too.”
“I wasn’t saying that, Professor,” James stammered.
“What were you saying exactly?”
Sam looked over to James, saw the way that he was practically quivering.
“He was saying that parallel lines are a complicated form of angulation,” Sam said.
Havash turned his gaze to him, and it was practically searing. It was a warning. Sam could see that much, even though he had no intention of abiding by it. What was Havash going to do? He was the one who brought Sam here. And Sam wasn’t about to allow James to be bullied by Havash just because he had made some offhanded comment to him.
“Are you such an expert on angulation?”
He felt James kick him, and Sam sat up. “I’m not an expert, professor. What you’re asking for is implementing the first three tenets of angulation. In this case, you’re asking for Goran to create a singular line, but with definite endpoints, so he needs to act upon each end in order to control that. The second tenet suggests that dispersing the draw of the Arcane Arts into a finite space poses unique challenges, and that says nothing about the third tenet, which calls upon the second drawing of—”
Havash tapped on the table. “Would you like to demonstrate what I’ve asked?”
Sam shook his head. “It is too advanced for me,” he said simply.
Havash stared at him, and it seemed as if his gaze was trying to bore through Sam as if he wanted to try to tell him something, but what? Did he want Sam to be silent?
“Perhaps I have asked too much of an entry-level student. If all you are capable of is the first tenet, then we will focus on a singular point. Is that satisfactory to you, Mr. Bilson?”
Havash didn’t turn to him, but Sam could practically feel everyone else in the classroom turning their attention to him as if watching to see how he might react.
“That would be more fitting, yes,” Sam said.
Havash stopped in front of the classroom, turning and looking outward. “Perhaps Mr. Ogilvy could demonstrate that much, at least.”
James started to stand, his chair scraping the ground as he did. Sam could feel the tension coming off of James, along with the discomfort that he carried with him.
“I can try to hold onto a discrete point. What would you like me to do with it?”
“Why, hold it. That is the nature of the first tenet, is it not?”
James blinked.
It was one aspect of the first tenet, a theoretical one, only a complicated theoretical aspect of it. If not acted upon, the Arcane Arts would spread infinitely, but if acted upon infinitely, it would remain in a singular point. At least, that was what Sam had learned from his reading. He had no idea if James knew that, though his parents both were Arcane Arts users, so Sam had to hope that he had some potential to do that. Perhaps more than Sam.
“I can try,” James said.
He held his hands together, staring at them.
As Sam watched, he saw a pale white beginning to bubble up within James. It was faint, little more than a tracing of it, and then it began to flow through his body, up to his chest, down his arms, and into his hands.
Then it faded.
James shook his head. “I can’t do it,” he said.
“Take a seat, Mr. Ogilvy. Apparently, theoretical is all you can manage. Or perhaps not even that much.”
James sunk down into the chair, and Sam looked over, but James stared straight ahead, a slight reddish flush working through him.
“Now, if all of you are only prepared for the theoretical application of the Arcane Arts, you will find the first exam to be more complicated than it needs to be. Today we will try to remedy that, and then I might have to have some words with your instructor. We will begin. I expect everyone to take detailed notes.”
All around him, everyone began to pull out their notebooks. Sam did not. He didn’t need it. He didn’t really have one, anyway, but if he was going to talk about the theoretical application of angulation, Sam had probably already heard it or read it, and it was a matter of trying to fit it into what he had learned.
When Havash turned back to face the class, he leveled his gaze on everyone, but it seemed to linger the longest on Sam.
A taunt—and a reminder.
Chapter Seventeen
James got up from the table in the dining room, looking over to Sam for a moment, before glancing down the length of the table, his gaze going distant. All around them were the sound of voices, other students chattering, and, something Sam thought that he might be the only one to notice, the occasional flash of power that Sam detected.
“What are you doing?” Sam asked him.
“That talk that Professor Havash gave us a week ago,” he said, keeping his voice low as he looked back to Sam, “it has me more worried than I probably need to be.”
“It’s just the first exam,” Sam said.
“The first exam, and I only have a week or so to get ready for it. And then what?”
“I don’t know,” Sam admitted. “We start preparing for the next one, I guess?” He didn’t really know what was going to be involved in additional testing, only that he suspected that he would be able to make it through the first round, and if it came down to trying to figure out more, Sam had to hope that he could use what he learned in the library to do so.
“You don’t have to be so flippant about it,” James snapped.
Sam chewed on a hunk of bread and shook his head. “I’m not being flippant about anything. I’m just saying—”
“You have all of this figured out. You don’t have to worry about it. Not like some of us do.” He turned, storming off.
Sam got to his feet, grabbing his tray and carrying it to the back of the room where it would be cleaned up. He hurried after James, but when he reached the hallway, he couldn’t see him anywhere.
Sam doubted that he would be able to offer much help in the way of helping James, but he knew that there would have to be something he could offer his friend. But he had another concern, and it was one that he hadn’t spent as much time as he needed to do in order to work through it.
His sister.
What would happen if she didn’t do well with the first test?
He had made a point of avoiding her, not wanting others within her tower to know that she was from the Barlands, especially given how Gresham treated him, but he worried about Mia and what she might encounter from them. If they were to treat her the same way as they treated Sam…
It was even more reason that she had to work hard. Studying was never Mia’s strength. She had always relied upon Sam for that, though perhaps she shouldn’t have.
A week. Maybe more. That thought kept coming back to him after what James had said. Havash had made him more uncomfortable than he probably needed to be about how he would perform on the test. It probably didn’t make any difference whatsoever for him to do well on the test. For that matter, Sam could probably just focus on what Havash wanted of him and satisfy the arcane asked that way, but the longer Sam spent in the Academy, the better he could position himself for the future.
Besides, he had something that he could hold over Havash. Havash had been the one to have brought Sam to the Academy. He had to keep that in mind, as well.
He wandered over to the library, nodding to Murial behind the desk, flashing a smile at her, before making his way back toward his usual spot.
And he realized that the library wasn’t as empty as he would’ve expected. Typically when Sam came at this time in the evening, the library was relatively unoccupied. It wasn’t until later that other students started to arrive, filling it with quiet co
nversation and people battling him for different books. Somebody sat in the booth nearest his usual spot. Sam couldn’t tell who they were, but maybe it didn’t matter.
He gathered a stack of books, including several on more advanced angulation, one on astronomy, several on mathematics, and finally, the largest of the books was on alchemy.
Sam carried them over to his booth when a voice caught his attention.
“That’s quite a few books for this late in the day.”
Sam looked over, half expecting it to be one of the librarians. They had grown accustomed to his presence in the library and even seem to tolerate him, for the most part. They never questioned how many books he gathered any longer, though he suspected that they thought he only skimmed through them, looking for pieces of information that would be useful to him. Sam had learned to read fast enough that he generally got through most of the books that he gathered. This might be a little aggressive for him, but the angulation books were not terribly long, and given that he was only trying to memorize them so that he could work through the theories within them later, it wouldn’t be as much of a challenge.
It was Tara Stone.
“You,” he said.
She frowned at him and grabbed the top book off his stack. “This is a little advanced for a first-year student. Or did you come here with more training than you acknowledge?”
It seemed to be an offhanded way of asking whether he was learning the Arcane Arts in the Barlands. Most people within his tower knew that he was from the Barlands, and other than James, everybody else seemed to give him the cold shoulder for it. They all likely expected that he would fail. Not only was he from the Barlands, but he was an older student. The people of his tower preferred to focus on those more likely to remain after the first year.
“I’ve worked through several of the lower-level texts,” Sam said. “They’re basic.” He looked up, meeting her eyes. “But I didn’t come here with much experience if that’s what you were assuming.”
She laughed, setting the book back down. “I’m not trying to upset you. Well, maybe I should. You did dance with me and then haven’t even bothered talking to me since.”
Sam was surprised by that. “I didn’t realize that you wanted to talk to a first-year student.”
She arched a brow at him. “Not even one who is working through Teller’s Theorem on Advanced Angulation?” She glanced down at his book. “I read that in my first year, too. Didn’t really understand it.”
Sam started to smile. “I don’t expect to understand it, either.” He carried his books over to the booth, setting them down. “It’s just that I’m trying to see if I can understand the tenets of angulation better .”
“Understanding them doesn’t always help you master it. To be honest, it wasn’t until I had a little more experience than I truly began to understand what they were writing about.” She shrugged. “Most times, I think they just wrote nonsense. The key is trying to pick out the truth from within the nonsense.”
“I’m not so sure that I can do that, either.”
“Well, you are just a first-year student.” She offered a hint of a smile. “You might not want others to see that Narcissen book. These days, anything that might even sniff of alchemy isn’t viewed altogether well.” She waved her hand. “Not that it was alchemy that was at fault.”
“What happened?”
“No one really knows. Some of us older students get to wander the upper aspect of the alchemy section, patrolling it,” she said, and Sam watched her for any sign of recognition that he had been down there but didn’t see anything. “Only the professors have spent any time in the alchemy section. Too dangerous for those of us without full training, apparently.”
“Is it really toxic to those with abilities within the Arcane Arts?”
“That’s what they say.”
“You don’t believe it?”
“There are ways to explore. How else do you think the professors had an opportunity to see what happened?” She shrugged. “Not that they talk about it. They’re the only ones that can go down there, and the Grandam has ensured that none of them even try it, not until they have a way of dispersing the danger.”
Several different questions sprung to mind. If Havash had some way of getting down into the alchemy section safely, why hadn’t he?
Unless he didn’t want to be seen going down there.
Or perhaps there was some other reason.
“What about other Academy staff with no ability of the Arcane Arts?”
“What do you mean?”
Sam looked around the library. He saw one of the librarians standing several stacks away, glancing in his direction. He didn’t want to be kicked out of the library, so he had to be careful not to do anything that might upset the librarians. “I’m just saying that there are others within the Academy who aren’t connected to the Arcane Arts. Have any of them gone down to see whether it impacts them?”
Tara shrugged. “Can’t say that I know. I haven’t been a hall monitor there for very long. I haven’t seen anybody else going down there.”
“Who have you seen going down?”
Tara crossed her arms. “Why all the interest in alchemy?” Her gaze flicked over to the book before looking up at him. “They’re going to think you’re with them.”
Sam frowned. “With who?”
She regarded him a long moment. “The attackers. Nighlan, to some. Anti-government to others. Not that the Academy is the government, but since so many of the council come from here, they figure it’s one and the same. So why are you looking into alchemy?”
“It just seems strange to me, that’s all,” Sam said with a shrug. “They haven’t investigated what happened?”
“I’m not saying that.”
“You just said that you haven’t seen anybody going down there.”
“I said there haven’t been many people going down there.”
“Then what is it?”
“You should focus on passing your test, Sam. You’re going to have a hard enough time anyway. I’ve heard how the professors talk about you.”
“You have?”
“Well, seeing as how you are the only person from the Barlands, they’re using you as a test case. They don’t expect you to make it very long here.”
“I thought that was only an issue after the first year.”
She frowned at him. “Whatever gave you that idea? In my year, there were two students who completely failed their first exams and were sent packing right away. None from our tower, thankfully. We generally have a pretty good track record when it comes to our testing and abilities. So if you were tested into the tolath power, then chances are good you will be just fine.” She chuckled, then looked down at his books again. “Especially if you’re reading those kinds of things.”
She winked at him and then took a seat back in her booth.
Sam sat down at his station, staring at the stack of books. Here he’d been working on the assumption that he had a full year for him to survive, but maybe he only had a week left.
And if he failed now, what would happen to his sister?
He had only managed to save three silvers. That wasn’t enough to do anything.
With the thought, he started laughing softly, shaking his head. Three silvers had once been a significant windfall, and here he was now trying to convince himself that it wasn’t enough? And he had access to the Academy library for the better part of the two months that he’d been here.
That was worth far more than three silvers.
With everything that he had learned, he thought that he could make his way as even a minor alchemist somewhere. Maybe not in Tavran, but he shouldn’t have ever thought that was going to be possible for him. He was too close to the Academy here.
Still, Sam didn’t want to leave.
When he had come, it had been solely for his sister’s benefit.
But now, he wanted to stay for himself.
How could he not? After havi
ng seen all of what was here within the library, Sam wanted nothing more than to have an opportunity to keep working through it.
He pulled the topmost book off his stack, and he started skimming through it.
A week.
If that was the case, then he had one of two options.
Either learn enough to ensure that even without demonstrating any ability with the Arcane Arts that he should remain within the Academy or try to study as much as he could despite the possibility that he would fail.
And if he did fail, then maybe Havash would help him. At least, Sam had to hope that he might. He leaned back, determined to tear through everything in the books.
Learn enough. Prove that he belonged for little while longer.
That was his new goal, regardless of what Havash wanted from him.
Chapter Eighteen
Sam sat out in the courtyard. His mind raced with everything that he’d been studying, trying to work through it, knowing that there was only another day or two before the tests began.
Not nearly enough.
James sat beside him, a book resting on his lap for angulation, an early and simple text, but that didn’t seem to bother James. He was determined to try to master as much as possible so that he could be ready. Despite Sam trying to offer him guidance about the various topics that he was reading about.
Other students were in the courtyard. It was part of the reason that James had dragged Sam out here, despite Sam’s interest in returning to the library. He had wanted more time to study, but perhaps he could spend a little while outside, especially since others had already started to come.
“See?” James said, elbowing him. They were seated on a bench near a small square in the Academy garden. The shrubs around them had been groomed to look like different animals, and the air smelled of the vibrant flowers that grew, bright yellow and red and green blooming all around them. “You just need to get out of the library once in a while.”
“I can’t take the library books out here,” Sam said.
“Not until you progress,” James said, turning his attention back down to the book.
Alchemist Apprentice (The Alchemist Book 1) Page 15
