Frost Fire - Part VII

They went back out into the courtyard to run through marching maneuvers for the remainder of the time until lunch.  The serving went well and quickly, and every time Kestrel saw Zavonie go by with a pile of dishes in her arms she had a warm fuzzy feeling.  Bob fizzed in her head in agreement as well.  

Their afternoon was spent in a building near the martial arts room that was set up much like the end of term exams were, with rows of desks.  They were handed an aptitude test as well as a list of jobs they would prefer.  It was explained that once they were finished with the test, if their results fit the jobs they requested, that was the way they’d go.  They would spend this evening speaking with advisors that would discuss their results.  

‘Another test?’ Kestrel thought to Bob, ‘That is so not fair.’  She half smiled to herself.  He agreed and assured her through feelings she’d do just fine.

The test was not what Kestrel expected; some of the questions she just had to imagine what it was like using some of her magical abilities and glyphs filled the section with the looping fractal-like script of the magical language.  This was the first such test she’d had and it was startling at first but became a much easier method of test taking as far as her writer’s cramp was concerned.  She sailed through the test until she got to a section on physical activity, and was surprised when answers started filling the section.  She read over them and found some words she didn’t even understand, but from what she could tell they talked about the martial arts she had experienced this morning.  She sent a thought to Bob that was half of a question about the words she didn’t know, and he burbled the feeling that he was just as confused as she was that they seemed to come from her head.

She didn’t notice that one of the answers to one of the questions changed.

XYZ  

Dinner was more of the same, as they served the other two cohorts their food, and ate once they had left.  Kestrel and Halby discussed the test with the rest of the table.

‘Wasn’t that the most odd test you’ve ever taken?’ said the short blonde boy with the freckles.  ‘Some of the words that were put down I didn’t even know!  How were they supposed to have come from my head, d’you figure?’

A quiet girl with dark hair and a blue streak through one side twirled her fork in one hand and added, ‘I’ve seen those tests before; they’re not necessarily glyphs that you don’t know, some of them are just more concise ways of explaining what you ‘said’ in your head.’  She twirled a lock around a finger as she speared a vegetable off her plate.  ‘It’s sort of like it’s translating; the only thing is it’ll pick up some things that you’re thinking below the surface.  Can’t hide anything from one of those tests.’

Bob sat on the table munching some Brie and several other ‘familiars’ ate some of their favorite foods as well.  It was so common for people to have a pet to assist in their magic that nobody took their appearance even in the mess hall as anything out of the ordinary.  The Ferret finished off his game hen and scampered to the blue-haired girl’s shoulder.  It was a testament to their magical nature that he didn’t even give Bob the faintest glance.  Bob would be on the list of prey for a normal ferret, whose favorite foot was chubby little rodents.  And nearly spherical, Bob was chubbier than most.

‘So, when did you have that kind of test before,  Alanda?’ asked the blonde boy, Kestrel finally pulled his name from her memory as Alexent – Alex to anyone who would listen.  She was surprised to note that most of the people who had been in her classes near the end of her time at University ended up in the other two cohorts.  She realized as dinner progressed and everyone started chatting like a cohesive group, that she had only really had one friend through school and had mostly avoided the rest of the people her age.

‘Oh, I went through some of that testing before University, I’d rather not talk about it.’  Alanda petted her ferret absent mindedly.  ‘Where do you want to end up after this Alex?’  

The blonde boy grinned cheekily.  ‘I have no idea, but wherever it is I’m sure I’ll drive as many people crazy as possible.’

‘You could be right there,’ said the redheaded boy next to him.  ‘Nobody’s quite as good at annoying as Alex.  I should know; taught him everything he knows, I did.’

‘You wish, Oscar.  Who was it came up with that prank on Professor Mikhail?’

Halby joined in, looking surprised he felt the need to say anything.  ‘Prank?  You mean that time he showed up to all of his classes with pink hair last year?’

‘Sure do!  It took him a week to figure out how it had been done, and another three days to reverse it.’  Alex speared a flat green vegetable off of Kestrel’s plate and chewed thoughtfully.  ‘Took me half the term to get it right.  Was worth the month of detention too.’  

‘You wouldn’t do anything like that though Kestrel.  You’re much too smart for that.’

‘Excuse me?’  Kestrel took another bite.  

‘Aren’t you supposed to be so smart and effortlessly good at everything?  You’re too good to think of pulling a prank on someone.’

Kestrel paused mid-chew and played that over in her head.  ‘Whatever gave you that idea?’

‘You’re usually all quiet and hardworking.  I’m sure you got great grades and never got in trouble.’  Added Oscar.  ‘Halby too, isn’t that why you like her so much?’

Kestrel looked at Halby who blushed and looked at her through his lashes a second before looking away with that half smile of his.  Kestrel got the impression that the world paused for a moment.  ‘Er, hey, it’s time we got moving; we’re going to have our meetings in ten minutes.’  She fumbled her fork as she picked up her dishes and started heading towards the dish washers, who were scrambling furiously to finish other cleaning in the kitchen.  She glanced back and saw that half smile of Halby’s following her for an instant.  She wondered before she stumbled how she could have ever thought he had an unfortunate nose.

Bob, irritated at being nearly forgotten hopped down from the table and scurried after her, leaping for her uniform belt and scrambling to her shoulder, chirruping all the way.  Sorry Bob, she thought.  He grudgingly forgave her and sent her a picture of mozzarella as a way to make it up to him.  

They had been told to go back to the barracks for the rest of the evening, and would be called in individually to discuss their test results and their future for the next four years.  Alex was first on the list to go, Kestrel would be nearly halfway down the list, followed by Halbey.  Inwardly she was very nervous; she hadn’t wanted to be here to begin with, and had no idea what to put down for a job, so she’d left those fields blank.  All she cared about was staying far away from the front lines of any scuffle that might be going on during her term.

She sat on her bunk and began to write a letter to Olive; she didn’t have much else to do other than talk to Bob, and since he didn’t speak in words exactly, that was liable to be a one sided conversation.  Halbey was drawing again when she dared to glance at him; the embarrassment of the incident in the mess hall was warring with her memory of that little half smile of his.  She couldn’t believe she’d never seen it before.

Her letter to Olive started off talking about the ride on the barge and slid right over to Halby.  She wrenched it away and wrote for a while about the sergeants and their first day, then this morning’s painful run.  Her mind wandered to Halby running in front of her on the way back.  She wrenched her thoughts and the letter away and back on track, telling Olive about the martial arts training, which had seemed so much easier and more fun than she ever would have thought.  

Glad she’d finally managed to keep the letter off the subject of Halby for a page or so, she was interrupted, ‘What are you writing?’

She fumbled her pen off the edge of her bed, and looked up before reaching for it, seeing that shy half grin again as Halby picked it up for her.  

‘Oh, just writing a letter to a friend.’  She folded it up and put it back into her cabinet, giving Halby a place to sit.   She scrabbled around in her brain for something to say that wouldn’t make her sound like an idiot.  ‘So… er, what did you put for your job preferences?’  

He looked away for a moment, ‘I wasn’t sure.  I don’t think I want to be here any more than you do.’

‘That’s saying something,’ Kestrel rolled her eyes and stuck out her tongue.  ‘I think if they follow us around and keep our mealtimes the same as they were yesterday, I might have to rip someone’s arms off and beat them with ‘em.’

‘I hear ya.  It’s much easier to deal with all of this if we can at least have a few moments to relax during the day.  I think things will be very different though once we figure out where we’re going to be.  Different lessons and all.’

‘Probably.’

‘I er, drew you something.’  He looked away and produced a piece of paper Kestrel recognized as previously being attached to his sketch book.  He handed it to her facing down and she took it with a questioning smile.  Turning it over she discovered he’d done a picture of Bob, and a bird.  They were just the right amount of fuzzy and feathery, and so detailed that she got the impression they could leap off the page if she looked away.  

‘This, this is amazing…’ she trailed off, hand rising to her chest.  ‘What kind of bird is this?’

He smiled that half-smile of his and looked away, wringing his hands together for a moment before answering, ‘It’s a Kestrel.’  He looked into her eyes and she smiled, touched.

No one has ever done anything like this for me before… thank you Halby.’  She realized how much she missed home already, and Bob fizzled a feeling in her head that seemed to say ‘you’ve still got me, you silly girl.’

‘Thanks Bob.’  She said the words before thinking, caught off guard by the sweet gift.  She realized what she’d said belatedly, and looked at Halby, startled.  He didn’t seem to notice the offhand remark to the little fuzzball, and instead took the picture from her and hung it over her cabinet with a bit of magic that would stick it to the wall and let her remove it when she was ready to leave this place without ruining it.

‘There, now nobody will be able to take it down or mess it up either.’  He nodded toward the door and the bedraggled girls that came in.  

The three complained loudly about how they had been so ‘put upon’ to have to do manual labor without magic.  Peppered throughout Zavonie’s monologue were words like ‘outrage’ and ‘you just wait’, while Rabanie and Bernice nodded and interjected irritated agreement.  Alex and Oscar just laughed and came over to sit across from Kestrel and Halby.

‘Oh, you’re back already?  How was the meeting Alex?’

‘Aww it wasn’t too bad.  Looks like I’ll be sent off to one of the ports on the coast.’

‘Well that’s good isn’t it?’

‘Well, it’s not terrible.  My parents used to take me out there every summer.  With any luck I’ll get sent back to Exetport.’  He said, eyes glazing over in memory.

‘What’s in Exetport?’ asked Halby.

Alex took in a deep breath and let it out slowly, eyes half shut ‘Sunreenia…’   He drew the name out as if it were the most wonderful thing in the world.

‘Sunreenia Quickrose,’ said Oscar.  ‘His unrequited summer love to hear him tell it.  Though she doesn’t know he exists – Hey!’  Alex hit him at that revelation.  Kestrel could tell it was quite an old revelation at that.

‘Oh you wait, she’ll come around.  I’m the man of her dreams!’

‘Only she just doesn’t know it yet…’

‘Exactly!’

Oscar quirked an ironic eyebrow at the other two, who promptly burst out laughing.  

‘You go on and laugh, but she will be mine, oh yes she will.’  He stood and put a foot up on the bed, hoisting an imaginary sword.  ‘I am her prince charming.’

‘Well, prince…’ said Halbey, ‘You seem to have your pants on backwards.’

Alex started and looked down.  ‘I meant to do that!’  He sat down casually ignoring his pants, and reclined regally.  A pillow smacked him in the side of the head.

‘Get off my bed prince, you’re much too charming for me.’  Alanda had come back from her meeting, and sent Bernice off.  ‘Go on, shift.’  She sat down as Alex pushed his friend to the end of the bed.  

Kestrel laughed and Bob hopped over to Alanda’s lap, flipped over and waited for her to pet him.  Her ferret came up, shoved him off, and took his spot and position.  ‘Sorry Bob, place of honor belongs to Perrin here.’

Bob, looked affronted, and hopped onto Halby’s lap, who obligingly petted him and made him purr.

‘Where’d you end up Alanda?’  asked Kestrel.

‘Oh, I’m getting trained up as a machinist.’

‘Really?’ said Oscar.

Alanda, irritated, looked at him, pausing in mid-pet.  ‘What, girls aren’t supposed to be good with machines or something?’  Her voice nearly dripped with scorn.

‘No, of course not, I just figured you for more of an artillery girl is all.’

She looked sternly at him, then burst into laughter.  ‘I’m actually going to be working on some of the larger weapons used on the front lines.’

Oscar snorted and bowed while sitting. ‘my lady, I misjudged you.  You have quite enough artillery in that evil look of yours.’  He grinned.  ‘Congratulations.’

Kestrel had known about the war their lands had been having for the last, oh, what was it, thirteen years now?  She tried not to think about it because it was so far away, and there had always been other things closer to home that she’d been thinking about.  History tests and midnight trips to the library for instance.  There was a whole chunk of land to the east that was held by a group of militants that thought people shouldn’t be ruled by any government; and they could get along fine without being told what to do all the time.  Because they preached against organization, their territory had been growing smaller and smaller every year because they were so disorganizd as a military.  For no reason that Kestrel could understand, they just kept attacking and trying to build up their lands.  Every few years they would manage it, only to be pushed back.  She wondered what the point of it all was.  

In the mean time however, she was much more excited to be sitting in a group of people her age that genuinely seemed interested in spending time with her.  Having a group of friends was a new experience, and she just hoped it would last.  Bob burbled confidence that it would, and to stop worrying already and just enjoy it.

When it came down to it, he was so much smarter than she was.  

The evening passed slowly until her time came, and a dark haired girl who seemed busy writing all the time Kestrel had noticed her, told her to get going to her interview.

She became instantly nervous and noticed with a small part of her brain that it was odd that she was nervous.  Another part of her brain noted that her palms had instantly become sweaty, and wondered why they did that when she was nervous.  How could they produce that much liquid with that little warning?  A third part of her brain told the second to shut up already, what kind of loser was she wondering about things like that at a time like this?  And a fourth told them all to be nice, and leave poor Kestrel alone so she could get this over with.

She climbed down the stairs and instead of exiting the building, turned left into what proved to be an office.  A man she hadn’t yet met sat behind a large desk with a sheaf of paper and dark, open eyes.  He indicated that she should sit in the chair across the desk from his, then folded them primly on top of the desk.

‘So, you’re Kestrel Greenlake, correct?’

‘Yes, er…’ she looked and found no insignia on his clothing, ‘…sir.’

‘Your test results were very interesting.  First, however, I noticed that you didn’t put anything in the job preference list.  I’ve taken the liberty to correct that small error.’  

Kestrel looked at him, puzzled.  ‘But, I thought I’d be discussing this with you, not getting randomly assigned..  Why did you do that?’

‘Because, my dear, leaving it blank usually means you get thrown into infantry.  And you’re much too smart for that.’

Having felt perfectly average through most of her life, Kestrel wasn’t particularly used to hearing that.  ‘What do you mean?’