Page 6 of A Theory of Dreaming
“What is that?” he asked.
“I’m sure you’re familiar with the role of a legate. Along with the uniform policy, I convinced Dean Fogg to revive this tradition as well. As a legate, you’ll be the student head of the college—my eyes and ears among the pupils. Don’t worry, it’s mostly a ceremonial role. Another achievement to pad an already impressive résumé.”
Preston was frozen with shock. Gosse had to grasp him by the wrist, pry his fingers open, and deposit the pin into his hand. Only then did Preston turn over the miniature dragon, feeling the raised texture of its scales. And yet all he could think was that his were the first Argantian hands to ever touch it.
“Well, you couldthankme,” Master Gosse said, feigning offense. “Another master might have chosen some sniveling toady... like Southey, that fourth-year. But I’ve always appreciated a bit of imperiousness. I’ve often been accused of arrogance and caprice myself, but...”
Master Gosse’s voice faded to the background as Preston looked down at the dragon pin. For all its opulence, the untarnished gleam of green and gold, there was something unnervingly lifeless about it. Not the ordinary lifelessness of an object that had never been animate but the grim rigidity of a creature, once alive, now magicked into stone. A mystic undeath.
Preston closed his fingers around the pin, letting its coldness seep into his skin. He looked up at Master Gosse again.
“You’d better get going, Héloury,” Gosse said. “Or we’ll both be snowed into this office with only a quarter of a bottle of scotch for sustenance. And take that uniform for your compatriot.” His lips stretched into a resplendent smile. “You may need to let it out in the bust.”
Face burning, Preston snatched the bundle of clothes from the desk. He tucked the uniform under his arm, planning to protect it as best he could from the fast-falling snow, and then left Master Gosse’s office without another word.
Three
The stone was slow in its spreading,
And thus all the more reason for dreading
The fate of the maiden foretold.
—from “The Garden in Stone” by Laurence Ardor, Lord of Landevale, 82 AD
“It couldn’t have beenthatbad.”
Effy glumly stirred her tea, watching the milk ribbon through the water. Steam rose from the cup when she lifted it, making her eyes sting. She told herself that was theonlyreason she was close to crying.
“You weren’t there,” she said. “It was humiliating.”
At least she had managed to hold back her tears for the entirety of the class. The very moment the small hand of the clock ticked to six, she had bolted from her seat and rushed to the door. The rows of identically uniformed students had watched her furious exit with disdain, raised brows and smirking mouths, but she didn’t care. As soon as she was out, through the lobby and into the courtyard, the world turned grayscale with the heavy streaks of winterrain, and she inhaled the crackling-cold air and felt her limbs go boneless with relief.
When finally she arrived back at her dorm, soaked to the bone, Rhia waiting with tea and a deadpan joke about the weather, Effy was overcome with a horrible sense of familiarity. She had been here before, drenched and shivering in the corridor, her mind playing the images of so many sneering faces over and over again. She’d been fleeing from the architecture college then—from the cruel slur penciled next to her name—from the terrifying possibility of catching Master Corbenic’s eye—
The players were different now, but the script was the same. And somehow she had slipped back into the very same role herself, with the weary inevitability of a wheel falling into its groove. Only this time, when Effy had reached into the morass of her own mind, searching for the perverse comfort of the Fairy King, her fingers outstretched for his bone-white hand, she had found nothing. She was alone, adrift in an ageless, incomprehensible dark.
“So you didn’t know how to play some stupid counting game.” Rhia raised one shoulder in a shrug. “Men are idiots. They’ll probably forget by tomorrow.”
Effy doubted that very much. Especially not with today’s newspaper making its rounds through the student body, her name printed in that bleak, accusatory ink.
“Itisstupid,” she replied, letting out a shakily defiant breath. “If I had known studying literature meant reciting a list of numbers—”
Abruptly she stopped herself. If she had known—then what? She would have stayed in the architecture college? Would she never have gone to Hiraeth at all? Would she have let herself drown in that basement, Preston chained helplessly beside her?
Rhia gave her a searing look, but she raised her cup to her lips rather than reply.
Not more than a moment later, there was a knock on the door. Rhia rose and went to the corridor to answer it, while Effy stared down at the tea in her mug, transfixed by its total stillness on the surface. She had put in too much milk, which had ruined the taste and turned the water too cloudy to see her own reflection.
From the hallway, Rhia called out, “Your partner in academic crime is here.”
“We’ve not committed a crime,” came Preston’s indignant reply.
“No, the Ministries of Culture and Defense are just investigating you for totally innocent reasons.” Effy could practically hear Rhia rolling her eyes. She rose quickly and went into the corridor, hoping to head off the inevitable bickering.
She arrived just in time to catch Preston say sourly, “They’re investigating ourdocuments, not us.”
“Pedantic as ever,” Rhia said. “You could have at least stamped the snow off your boots.”
