Nothing about the market would indicate this day was different from any other, unless one knew what to notice.
Some stalls were closer to the Academy walls. Some goods were polished up and pushed to the front. Some places had little streamers – just a few thin ribbons, really, not enough for real streamers – it wouldn’t do to make it seem as if there were anything particularly special about today. There was, after all a tense standoff between the inhabitants of the city and the inhabitants of the Academy, who – unlike the inhabitants of the Palace – at least pretended to be real people, of the town. It wouldn’t do to over-acknowledge them. But, new eyes could be caught by little lures, and after all, money was money.
The biggest difference outsiders wouldn’t notice at all: more uniforms, but gray ones. Academy Guards and regular soldiers needed more force to elicit the same peace hard earned by Capitol Guards, and because it was the Academy’s business, this day, they would get little help from the usual enforcers of order. Then again, it wouldn’t be the same as any regular fair, anyway; the city’s cut-purse thieves would be more daring with a country crowd, no matter why that country crowd gathered. Slinging his bag back around, so the burden rested on his back rather than at his hip, was a painful concession to appearances (though not too bad for his city-born pride – not only would they mostly get away with old underclothes, but he had flipped and reinforced the seams such that it would be a sharp knife indeed that could get through without alerting him).
Pleasantly – that is, not needfully – hungry again, he walked along the Academy walls for his final purchase of the day. Already, he had gone from the southern wall, where he could get the best pipera in town, to the warren of bridges in front of the palace that held his favorite views and the best parks, and even as far west as the Street of Dreaming, at the very edge of the Families’ neighborhood. Its brightness dimmed by daylight, the bustle of crowds, gatekeepers, and performers but poorly mimicked by light breezes pushing through the gaudy hangings, it nonetheless held true to some very fond memories of very good nights that would be a long time coming again.
He owed his last mission to his Aunt, and even though it was a little embarrassing, it wasn’t as if anyone would know, and he really did owe it to her to fulfill it.
With her usual unnerving exactitude, the directions in her letter led him precisely where he needed to go.
“Early yet, for apples, isn’t it?” Esras smiled, and the apple-seller looked up from arranging her cart. She put fists on her broad hips, broader for the rumpled apron on them, and after a hard moment, decided to smile at him.
Good. Very good. Esras held up a coin, made his grin lopsided and roguish. “In case you wondered.”
“Never doubted, young master; city folk are honest folk,” she said.
He tried not to let her response disappoint him. Though she stood aside to let him choose, he shook his head, returning formality for formality.
“Oh, no, mistress – you choose.”
“Ah,” she smiled more broadly, crook-toothed and charming, which probably meant she had a very big knife somewhere. One could always afford to be more affable the less one worried about being robbed. “A new cadet!”
She turned to rummage through the apples on display; Esras waited, thinking far too hard. Finally, she handed him a nice, bright, fist-sized apple, and took the coin he offered.
“How did you know?” he asked – it didn’t hurt to ask, did it? Not right now. Later, he would have to be more careful.
“Luck,” she said, then rested a pointed finger on the apple in his hand. “That’s good luck, to let the peddler pick, for a new venture – and what other venture’s going on today? So good luck, young master – I won’t be seeing you again soon.”
“How did you know I was from the city?” he asked.
“Oh, and sharp,” she chuckled. “You might not need luck, but never turn it down, ha – don’t worry, they won’t know. And you ask yourself how you can tell about them, and that’ll tell you how I can tell about you.”
He returned her nod, continuing on and staring at a quite small, but still quite nice-looking apple. Aunt Grainne, of course, told him to buy the mealy apple whatever he got and be happy about it because it didn’t do to ask for luck and then be ungrateful. He saw several more piles of apples as he went, on the edges of market stalls, but he seemed to have found the one dedicated cart, so there was something to think about. He rubbed the skin with his thumb and wandered slowly towards the Western Gate.
Dominicus threw up in a bush behind a lace stall, much to the disgust of both the owner and himself. The last good Midraeic meal he would have in some time, and he couldn’t hold it down. What a waste.
Don’t let them see you weak, his patron’s representative had said. It was too strange, at the time, for him to react. Looking at him as if he knew as little about what to do with Dominicus as Dominicus did with a fancy, tall, Ainjir advocate, the good Baron Seolgaire’s representative just seemed to push the words out in spite of himself. They wear gray, like wolves, because they are wolves, and they pick off the weak, even when it’s their own.
So Dominicus waited out of sight of the gates until he had cleared himself out of things to throw up. Now, he had no choice but to walk up. It was still early, but he didn’t know what else to do. The ropes holding closed his bag dug into his shoulder; they were stiff, since they had replaced them so his traveling bag would look less shabby.
As the roadstones grew ever-more pitted under his feet, a gold-trimmed carriage pulled up to the wall. A weeping, feather-bedecked woman emerged, kissing and patting a grey-clothed young man who looked like he had about a foot and a half and hundred pounds on Dominicus. The young man, who seemed only mildly embarrassed by this display, waved to what were apparently friends, also clustered in a gray-streaked group by the Academy gates.
This was, in fact, one of several carriages, waiting in procession (Why wouldn’t you just get out and walk?). Those were only one of several groups of young men, all of whom seemed to be both taller and happier to be here than him. (Why in sweet fuck were Ainjir so tall?) Some of those young men had on fucking swords. (Fucking swords!)
He’d never even seen a sword. He supposed those were real swords – they could be for show, maybe? Was he supposed to have a sword? Also, was he already supposed to have something gray to wear? He had his embroidered shirt – his nicest shirt, with the sky-blue colors of the Holy Lady weaving patterns and flowers over the edges of rough red cloth. His pants were… pants. They all seemed to have some kind of striping on theirs. Was he already doing something wrong? He had heard that nobody knew what the Academy was like until they had been through – that he would be taught everything that he was supposed to know once they let him in.
Then again, they were Ainjir. Who knew what they knew? They certainly wouldn’t tell him.
“Hey, get us something, would you?”
A hand waved in front of his face, and he stepped back. A tall, brown-haired Ainjir boy – the gray he was wearing in tasteful accents on what looked like hideously expensive, quilted, fluffy blue cloth (really far too warm for today’s weather, but maybe he liked to sweat) – turned and scoffed back at a small group of other Ainjir behind him. He faced Dominicus again, and held out a slip of paper.
“Take this to one of those stalls and pick up some buns. We’re hungry. I’ll get you a bit when you get back.”
Dominicus stared at him.
“Ah, slow?”
“No, sometimes they don’t speak the language,” another obscenely tall boy said, stepping forward, “you know, maybe he just got here. Looks kind of country. Might not know.”
“Tits,” the Ainjir boy said conversationally, and for a minute Dominicus wasn’t sure he spoke the language. “Look,” he held up the slip, “credit – go get four,” and he held up four fingers, “there–”
The Ainjir boy had reached out to grab his shoulder, to turn him in the right direction. Dominicus blocked with a forearm.
Seemed clear enough, but because they were staring, he said, “No.”
There was another pause. In this pause, typically, back home, Dominicus would have started running, because four-on-one were shit odds. As Catillia often said, slow to think meant slow to move, so he could probably get away. At this moment, not only did he not know where to run, but he was pretty sure running would get him lost, and he had to be here when the gates opened.
Additionally, this was not his hometown, a conclusion easily deducible by how fucking long he traveled to get here, the obscene size of the place, and the sheer proximity of so many Ainjir. If he had been around this many Ainjir in his hometown, it would have meant he was very, very much on the wrong side of that town, and could expect a beating at any moment regardless of whether he refused a request. Here, obviously, things were different. And, regardless of whether they were different in this particular place, they had to be different at this particular time, because he had to be here, beating or no.
It remained to be seen if the Ainjir recognized this.
“No need to be rude,” the boy said, stepping away and back to his friends. “Bravery’s Balls, you give them an inch...”
Well, that was nice. Not getting a beating was good. Also, with a churning feeling in his stomach, he was realizing just how much he was going to get to practice speaking Ainjir. Somehow, he hadn’t thought about it, and his queasy stomach was quickly being joined by a headache. He wouldn’t be hearing any Midraeic for a while. He passed the group to walk towards the gates and find somewhere out of the way to sit and wait.
There wasn’t much available to sit on – the space was very clear, despite the growing crowd and passing carriages, and what appeared to be an expanding pile of luggage. He looked down at his bag again – made of scrap material, it was striped with color, ragged edges sewn out so it had a nice fluffy fringe, and squeaky new ropes – and over to the boxes – literal boxes, as in, that was a box of brandy bottles – some of these carriages were unloading.
He had been told the Academy would provide for all basic needs. Brandy wasn’t really a basic need (could he use some? Yes. Need? No, probably not). He could see the sense in packing some – a bottle. God only knew what they thought bringing boxes was going to get them.
Putting his bag down in a clear space, he stood over it and put his back to the gates, so he wouldn’t have to acknowledge them. Watching all the Ainjir mill about wasn’t that much better, though. Except that now and then he spotted someone milling about who wasn’t wearing gold thread and gray, and they sometimes even looked almost as miserable as he felt.
“Look, two bits, okay? You’re just standing about – come on, the gates will open any minute and we can’t miss it, and if when you get back the ceremony’s started you can keep the buns as payment. Deal?”
Dominicus looked at him. Maybe it was the same boy, maybe it wasn’t – he hadn’t paid that much attention and they had the same hair color, so they weren’t that easy to tell apart. Blue jacket, though, so probably the same one.
The Midraeic word wasn’t that different. He was sure he was saying it right. “No.”
“Bullshit,” the Ainjir said. “Don’t get greedy – just go off and try to get back quick.”
“Leave it,” one of the others in the group said. “What difference does it make? We’ll be busy and forget about being hungry.”
“Maybe it’s easy to forget being hungry but it’s hard to forget someone being rude,” the Ainjir facing Dominicus said back to them. He turned, in what was probably supposed to be a threatening way, towards him. “What’s the remedy for that?”
“This isn’t your fucking estate, Brahn,” the previous objector said.
“Yeah,” another chuckled, “its ‘the city’ – fucking gutter more like. Let a kneeler be rude here, it’s all they’ve fucking got.”
“Good point,” the one facing him said. He dropped the credit slip. “There’s something for you – let’s see if you’re too rude to eat.”
Somebody’s mother or sister or lover was wailing behind him, closer to the gates, and the little group of Ainjir were already turning to enjoy the show. Watching the slip of paper float to the ground, Dominicus tried to think of what to do, and instead, thought of his mother’s final advice. His mother had stood placidly in front of him in the kitchen. She had put her hands on his shoulders and told him to do his best.
Catillia – dearest, eldest, damnedest sister – stuck a wet finger in his ear while they were distracted. His mother, without losing her calm and sincere smile, lunged for an onion on the table and threw it behind him in a side-long sling at Catillia’s face. It bounced off Catillia’s defending arms and hit him in the back of the head. He had turned to try to catch her before she did anything else but Catillia was trying to catch the onion before it hit the ground and accidentally slapped/punched him in the face. As Catillia laughed, his mother cursed her very bones in a potent mix of Ainjir and Midraeic (her ability for obscenity, though rarely called upon, remained unsurpassed in her children’s estimation).
After a second brief scuffle, Catillia sat giggling at the table, bleeding from scrape to her neck. His vision still blurry and eyes watering, he tried in vain to see if his nose was bleeding. His mother calmly placed her hands back on his shoulders. She told him that he should probably try to avoid repeating anything she had just said, but he might want to remember some of them. Catillia, choking on her own breath, told him to keep it to ‘fuck off’ unless it was a special occasion.
His mother looked sweetly into his eyes and said – only if that was the best that he could do.
Dominicus stepped on the credit slip as it landed, and tapped the Ainjir on the shoulder. Once he turned around, Dominicus punched him in the face.
Bastard didn’t even dodge – just started bleeding from the nose. For a moment, they seemed unsure of what to do. Then all three of the others started forward, and Dominicus retreated so his bag was between his legs – at least his things might not be destroyed once he was surrounded.
As if out of mist, two big, broad-shouldered young men in gray uniforms appeared between them. There was a brief scuffle, but once they noticed the uniforms, the little group of Ainjir backed off.
One of the gray-uniformed young men pointed at them warningly. “Don’t mess with the locals.”
He turned to Dominicus. “Probably best you find a different place to loiter today.”
The other cadet poked him with an elbow, leaned over, and whispered something in his ear. Though their expressions didn’t change, Dominicus felt his back prickle.
The cadet who had whispered now looked at each of them in turn. “Don’t fuck around the first day.”
With that, they both walked away. Regardless of the implication of the cadet’s advice, Dominicus took it before the others had too long to think about it. He picked up his bag and wandered closer to the gates, putting some distance between himself and his future classmates.
“Is that not Esras Cole, the fiend?”
Looking up, Esras spotted a somewhat familiar – if stretched and a bit overgrown – face, hovering above a lanky body clad in something very close to, but not quite, a gray uniform. It took a moment to remember.
“Finanin Griofa,” Esras said, smiling. He tossed his apple core in the direction of the gutter and approached.
“How fortunate,” Finanin said, reaching out to clasp arms as if they were old friends.
They weren’t enemies, and that was enough. Esras hadn’t quite figured out what he was going to do when he spotted an old enemy, but Finanin had been in an entirely different – and far lower – rank set at Prep. They had hardly looked at one another, much less spoken. Perhaps he was trying to make himself more memorable by growing out that scraggly beard, but it just made his freckled face look moldy.
He did not reflect on his own attempts at beard-growing.
“Seen anyone else yet?” Esras asked.
Finanin shook his head, putting a foot up on a man-sized trunk so he could rest his elbow jauntily on his knee as they spoke. “I’m afraid we rather misjudged the time. Been waiting an age, but most of it trying to find our way around the damned place. Between the trip out and finding the gate…and, well, my family’s land is so far, you see…”
But he couldn’t figure out how to segue that into talking about Esras, or his family, because he knew nothing about Esras, or his family.
“Won’t be long, yet,” Esras noted, nodding up to the palace tower in the distance, but Finanin, not being from Capitol, didn’t know how to read the time from the shadow on the palace tower, so he just nodded awkwardly back while Esras internally berated himself for the error.
“You seen anyone else, then?” Finanin asked.
“No,” Esras replied. “Just got here.”
Finanin fidgeted in the silence, then fessed up.
“I thought I saw Maoilin,” Finanin said, without much enthusiasm – made sense, Maoilin was not just an asshole but an asshole with better titles and therefore too good to hang out with Finanin – “Dara’s family seal is on some of those boxes.” He was starting to realize, perhaps, that keeping his list of observed Prep cadets to those whose company might make him look good wasn’t a winning strategy – or, at least, lying about having not seen anyone meant they had nothing to talk about. “I guess I definitely did see old Seolgaire’s ninety-fifth grandson, whatever his name was…”
“Ardghal?”
“Bit of a misnomer, that,” Finanin grumbled.
“He is big,” Esras agreed.
“Won’t be come mid-year.”
“Ideally, we’ll get bigger,” Esras said – and it did, at this point, look like they were a ‘we,’ given that neither had yet run across a better set of allies.
“Speak for yourself,” Finanin said, stretching. “The ladies in my part of the country go in for lithe – like the hunting Prince not one of them has ever in her life seen. You would think a lover who might go away at a convenient time would loosen their standards, but none wanted to risk absence making the heart grow fonder.”
“Other fields, other blossoms,” Esras replied, and begged Mercy the subject would change. He left that foolishness behind at Prep. Not only would there not be time, but he was done with that game, and doubly so in that butchered tales of Academy romances filled so many bit-papers in the Capitol. Sure, maybe he had read few – or few dozen – when he was twelve, but….
“Ah, yes, I remember now: famously poetic, Esras Cole.” Finanin replied with a grin, and Esras surprised himself both by how fiercely he wanted to punch him and how successfully he resisted the urge.
“But then,” Finanin went on, miserably, “no shortage of blossoms about, but none that we’ll see, unless of course you fancy gray–”
But he was saved – the gate opened.