Page 10 of The Study of Magic
“I’m surprised you haven’t read our files,” Ari said.
He had. They were filled with dry facts and dates. “You were both assigned to the same unit when you were promoted to the Commander’s garrison, but that doesn’t tell mehowyour friendship formed.”
“Ho, boy,” Janco said. “That story will takeallnight.”
“No, it won’t,” Ari countered.
“Yes, it will. Because it’s more than us meeting at the castle complex. It goes back to before. To why we joined the army and what happened along the way.”
“Valek doesn’t want to hear all that.”
“What else is there to do?” Janco looked at Valek.
While he suspected the story would be a rambling account with lots of tangents and details he didn’t need to hear, Janco had a point. There was nothing else to do.
“Go ahead,” he said.
Janco rubbed his hands together as glee shone in his eyes. Valek already regretted encouraging him and the man hadn’t said a word yet.
“When I was eleven, two major things happened that shaped my life,” Janco said. “My father was lost at sea, and the Commander took over Ixia.”
CHAPTER3
Eleven? Janco was starting his story at the age of eleven. Ari rubbed a big hand over his face and gave Valek a this-is-all-your-fault look.
Janco ignored Ari and continued. “As a result of my father’s death, we moved from the coast of MD-7 to my uncle’s farm in the middle of nowhere. Oh wait, I think the tiny village in central MD-7 had a name… Boring Ville? Or was it Yawn Town? The only improvement from coastal living was the lack of sand. Sand is an evil substance. Let me tell you just how evil. One time?—”
“Stay on topic,” Ari warned.
“Oh. Right. Where was I?”
“Yawn Town.”
“Right. The place was surrounded with crops as far as the eye could see. Bored to a point that one more conversation about green beans would literally cause my head to explode, I began an earnest career in getting away with things.”
“Things?” Valek asked.
“Yup. Anything. Stealing, swearing, sabotaging, refusing, arguing, shirking any and all responsibility. Anything. The goal was not to get caught, but if I was…” He shrugged. “The punishments didn’t stop me or slow me down. Just encouraged me to be smarter. And then the Commander’s Code of Behavior arrived in town, and I had an entire new list of things to get away with.”
“Except murder,” Ari said as he added another log to the fire. Sparks flew into the air.
“Oh yes. Of course not murder or harming another person. I’d never do that. Well, I would defend myself if someone attacked me, but I wouldn’t instigate. One time, my annoying cousins stuffed?—”
“No one cares about your cousins,” Ari said.
Janco pouted.
“Do you have siblings?” Valek asked.
“No.” He sounded horrified. “Thank fate. My mother said I was a difficult baby.”
“Still are,” Ari muttered.
“Cute. Anyway, over the next seven years I became a frequent visitor of the local jail. My mother would bail me out. But while I was in there, I made friends with Anders, a man who was serving a twenty-year sentence for burglary and assault with a deadly weapon. He claimed it wasn’t him and that he’d been framed.”
Valek huffed. Everyone incarcerated claimed they were innocent.
“I freely admitted my guilt and bragged about it. But to meet someone who was so sincere and so miserable…” Janco rubbed the scar that crossed from his right temple to where the bottom half of his right ear used to be. “And so convincing. I stopped my getting away with things and switched to breaking Anders out of jail.”
