“Hello?” Called out a tentative, yet surprisingly cheery sounding voice.
Jeez. What now? I opened my eyes again and swung my legs to the side, sitting up. “Come in,” I muttered.
A smiling face peered round the door. “Hey! You must be Mack.”
A girl of about seventeen with short dark hair and a purple robe came in, sticking out her hand. She looked vaguely familiar for some reason. I stared at her outstretched palm for a heartbeat and then shrugged and took it. She shook my hand enthusiastically.
“I’m Mary. Level Four. I can’t believe you get your own room! Only the trainers normally get their own rooms.” She wrinkled her nose for a moment. “It is a bit, er, stuffy though, isn’t it? Maybe we can get you some air freshener or something.”
I continued to stare at her. I seemed to have been beset upon by the human teenage equivalent of an over-enthusiastic Labrador.
Without appearing to even stop for breath, she continued. “So, did you meet with the Dean? He normally greets everyone when they arrive for the start of the academic year, but of course you’re a bit late for that. I’m sure you’ll catch up really quickly though, I’ve heard you’re, like, amaaaazing at Protection.”
I finally found my voice. “Um, yeah, I did meet with him. He wasn’t very friendly.”
“Ah, he’ll get over it.” She bounced down onto the bed. The mattress springs let out an alarming groan that she seemed not to notice. “Can you show me?”
“Show you what?” This girl was becoming more and more confusing by the second.
“The green fire thing that you do. I’ve never seen anyone with any colour other than blue. I’m not really much good at that myself. Illusion is, like, more my kind of thing, which is a bit boring really.” Mary looked at me expectantly with an eager glint in her eyes.
I tucked my hair behind my ears and regarded her steadily. “How do you know about that? And why are you being so friendly? Everyone else seems terrified of me.”
She laughed out loud. “Gosh, I’m so sorry, I should have explained properly. I have an older sister – Martha?”
Dawning realisation hit me. Martha was the mage who had come to pick up my theoretically comatose body in Inverness. Except it had been Mrs. Alcoon who was comatose, not me.
Mary carried on. “She says you met her and that you, like, saved her life. She’s a pain in the arse, really. I mean, I love her and all but she’s a bit full of herself sometimes, working for the gatekeepers and all. So it’s kind of cool that you managed to beat her in a fight. And, don’t tell her, but it’s also kind of cool that you rescued her. She asked me to make sure that you’re all right and don’t get bothered that much. She thought things might get kind of messy.”
I raised my eyebrows at her. “Do you ever pause to take a breath?”
“Hahaha! You’re funny! Martha always says I talk too much.” She beamed at me happily.
“You said Martha’s a gatekeeper? What’s that?”
“Oh, they’re a bit like the police. They’re mages who excel at Protection,” she raised her eyebrows pointedly at me as she said this, “and who are recruited to keep the peace, watch out for rogue mages, deal with any incursions from other planes that we might be called upon to sort out. That kind of thing.”
Hmm. Well, Martha, who had unexpectedly – and rather pleasantly - become my apparent benefactress, might be a gatekeeper but Alex, the surfer dude mage who had helped me out in Cornwall, clearly hadn’t been. He had been terrified of any kind of fighting. So that would mean that with his skill at tracking he was probably into Divination. My ‘attitude’ had stopped the Dean from telling me more about the five disciplines, but this seemed like a good opportunity to find out more.
“So,” I said slowly, making sure I was getting this right, “Divination is about tracking things, then. With that blue light?”
“Yup. As well as a bit of fortune telling too and thought sensing for some mages.”
Right. So that would be what Mrs Alcoon had a small amount of skill in then. I definitely didn’t particularly like the idea of coming across any more talented mages who might be able to ‘sense’ what I was thinking, and made a mental note to find out later if there was a way to block my thoughts and maintain my privacy.
Mary continued, “Illusion speaks for itself really – we can make things appear differently to what they are. You know, so if, like, a great lumbering giant appears out of a portal, we can make him appear normal to the humans so they don’t freak out. Kinesis moves objects around. Some mages who are really good at it can send something from here to an address in Australia in almost the blink of an eye.”
“You mean like email?” I asked drily.
She gave a surprised giggle. “Yeah, I suppose a bit like email. And Evocation is the hardest one. There aren’t many mages who are skilled in that area. It’s when you, like, summon spirits to do your bidding. You know, fight for you, or create things. That sort of stuff.”
Interesting. None of this sounded like anything I could do. I wondered if they’d let me off if they realised that I was utterly unskilled at anything other than lighting a funny looking fire? It was worth investigating.
I smiled my gratitude at Mary for her explanations. “That was really helpful.”
She beamed back. “Why don’t I show you around the school? That’ll help you too. It’s a bit of a maze until you get used to it, and you’ll want to make sure you’re on time tomorrow to take your oath. The Dean gets a bit angry when people are late, especially when it comes to the ceremonies and stuff.”
“Thanks, Mary, I appreciate all the help I can get.” And I really did. It was refreshing to have someone being nice to me. “I should probably stay here though. The not quite so helpful and forthcoming guy who brought me here is bringing some robes. Hopefully some toothpaste and a toothbrush too.”
“Oh, you mean Jeremy? He’s an idiot, but he’s okay when you get to know him. In fact…” Mary’s voice trailed off when the door creaked open, and the man himself stood in the threshold.
“Initiate Mary, you do realise that vespers are about to begin?”
She scrambled off the bed. “Sorry, Mage Thomas.”
“You’d better run,” he said pointedly.
She shot me an apologetic look, and a rueful grin, then escaped behind Jeremy – Mage Thomas – and out of the door.
Once she’d gone, he held out a bundle for me. “Here you go. Inside you will find a blue robe, some soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, electric razor, scissors and,” his lip curled distastefully for a moment, “clean underwear.”
I almost laughed for a moment but then paused, thinking about what he had said. “Um, electric razor and scissors? Why?”
“You need to shave your head, of course.”
I gaped at him, my stomach dropping. “What?”
“You heard me. All initiates are required to do so.”
“But why?”
He shrugged. “Tradition. Who knows really? You need to have it done regardless before the oath-taking ceremony tomorrow. It starts at dawn so you’ll need to be dressed and ready before 5am. I will come and pick you up here and take you directly there tomorrow morning. You will need to dispose of everything you are currently wearing.” He nodded at my neck. “Including that.” My hand flew to the necklace I’d worn every day since Mrs Alcoon’s alleged friend had placed it around my neck and caused all these problems in the first place.
“I was told not to take it off.”
“Well, now I’m telling you to take it off.”
It was becoming hard t
o ignore the supercilious tone in his voice, but I focused on the orders themselves instead to avoid snapping unhelpfully back at him. I wasn’t sure if I was going to be glad to get rid of the necklace, or sad that I’d miss its now familiar weight. I was damn certain, however, that I was going to miss my hair. Mage Thomas for his part seemed to know exactly what I was thinking because he placed the bundle down on the bed and smirked at me again as if he was suddenly amused. My eyes narrowed. Was he one of the telepathic mages?
He winked at me and made for the door. “Sweet dreams.”
Tosser.
Chapter Two
I woke early, well before my 5am pick up time. It was probably something to do with having the lumpiest, most uncomfortable mattress this side of the Equator, but at least it gave me enough time to sort myself out – although it didn’t help that I’d had several disturbing dreams involving a lithe black panther stalking me through the empty cobbled streets of London. I did not have a crush on Corrigan, I told myself firmly. That had been a mere blip caused by feeling a bit lonely and needing someone to reach out to. Shaking off the vestiges of the dream, I pulled myself off the bed and splashed my face with water to wake up and get a grip of myself.
It took me several moments to find my way into the blue robe that I’d been given to wear. There was some kind of strange complicated twist of fabric involved that had me cursing aloud. When I finally managed to fit myself into it properly
, I sat down heavily on the edge of the bed. I lifted a strand of hair and gazed at it mournfully in the pre-dawn darkness. Maybe I’d take the necklace off first instead.
I reached round the back of my neck, searching for the clasp to undo it. My fingers couldn’t seem to find it, however. I felt all the way along the length of the chain, but whatever mechanism had originally been in place now appeared to have disappeared. Okaydokay. Feeling rather weirded out, I yanked at the chain instead, trying to snap it. Nothing happened. I pulled harder but the thing remained stubbornly round my neck. It occurred to me that maybe I could squeeze it over my head and try to wiggle myself out of it, but when I started to pull it upwards
, rather than outwards, it seemed to tighten itself infinitesimally, and I couldn’t even scrape it past my chin. I was vaguely reminded for a moment of Frodo’s one ring and wondered idly whether the mages would free Mrs Alcoon if I threw myself into the fires of Mount Doom. It probably wasn’t an option. I shrugged to myself. If they wanted the necklace off that badly then they’d have to help me with it. After all, I figured, it was a bloody mage who’d put it on me in the first place so it would just have to be another bloody mage to take it off.
Of course it did mean that I was already putting myself in the position of incurring even more wrath from the Dean. I really needed a good report card if I was going to progress here and get out. Damn it. I reached over and picked up the scissors that Mage Thomas had left the night before. My fingertips began to tingle with a drumming heat that snaked its way up my arms, pulsing through my entire body. My bloodfire was clearly mirroring my unhappiness. I walked over to the sink with a heavy heart and poised the blades over a hank of h
air. Screwing my face up tight I began to cut, using the scissors to take off most of the length, then I grabbed the electric razor and switched it on. Its buzz reverberated through me and I almost threw the fucking thing against the wall to smash it to pieces, then swallowed down my angst and vanity and began to run it over my scalp, inch by inch.
It was difficult to know whether I’d managed to get all the hair off without a mirror to look into. I ran my hands over my head and was pretty sure there weren’t any odd tuft
s left. On the floor around me were all the forlorn remnants of the red hair that I was so proud of. It didn’t feel like that long since I’d managed to get the dye out that I’d used to stay nondescript in Cornwall. And now I was completely bald. It would probably take months, even years, for it to grow back to a reasonable length.
I paused for a moment. Mary had short hair, but I was sure that I’d seen lots of students the day before with longer hair. I tried to remember what colour robes they were wearing
, but before I could progress any further with my thoughts there was a knock at the door.
I stepped over and opened it. Mage Thomas was there, waiting. When he caught sight of my newly shorn head, his eyes widened and something flashed through them for a quick moment before disappearing.
“Like what you see?” I grunted.
He pursed his lips and didn’t reply, just waved at me to follow him.
I sighed and followed him yet again. This seemed to be becoming my life, trailing around after good old Mage Thomas and his winning ways.
I’d been expecting the oath taking ceremony to be held in some grand ballroom type arena, but surprisingly the mage led me outside towards the back of the school and down through a garden. The morning air was crisp and cold, and I was starting to shiver. You’d think that the mages would come up with some kind of garment for winter that would be more insulating. But, then again, perhaps I was so cold because I no longer had any hair of my own to cover my head. Certainly, my ears were starting go numb around the edges and the slight breeze blowing around my naked skull felt extraordinarily peculiar.
When we finally came to a halt, I realised that there was a small gathering of people awaiting our arrival. A stone statue of some be-robed man stood majestically over everyone, watching with sightless eyes. In front of the statue was a small altar and the Dean, holding a large worn-looking book in his hands. There was an element of surprise in his eyes as he looked at me, making me wonder if he’d thought that I would turn tail and run after our little chat the day before. He wasn’t going to get rid of me that easily. Still, he beckoned me over to stand beside him.