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“Oh, well, money’s different.” She frowned. “They said that?”
“No. That was private investigation on my part.” “I’m a bit brusque.” “‘Actively rude.’” “I’m blunt.”
“'Arrogant and misinformed.’” “I’m a bit on the, um, assertive side.” “I think the previous statement covered that, as well.” He put the papers down. “The rest?” “Variations?”
“Not precisely.” He leaned forward on elbows he placed, with care, to either side of the documents in question. “You are, according to the teachers who failed you, frustratingly bright. One even used the word precocious. But you have no focus, no ability to pay attention to anything that doesn’t suit you. Would you say that’s fair?”
“No.”
“What would you say, Kaylin?”
“I want to be out there. I want to be on the beat. I want to be doing something. I didn’t sign up with the Hawks to sit still while other people risk their lives—”
He lifted a hand. “I believe that this was also covered. And quoted. At length. Don’t feel a need to revisit it on my behalf. You did manage to learn to read. And to write. In two languages.”
“I had to,” she said woodenly. “The Hawklord—” He raised a white brow.
“Lord Grammayre,” she said, correcting herself, “said I was out if I couldn’t manage that. Because the Laws are written in Barrani—High Barrani—and if I didn’t know them, I couldn’t enforce them.”
“‘Represent them’ were the words he used, I believe. You learned to use weapons.”
She nodded.
“And you were skilled at unarmed combat.”
She nodded again. “Those were useful.”
“History does have its uses.”
“To dead people,” she said sullenly.
“Living people define themselves by their dead.”
She said nothing.
“You almost passed comparative religion. You paid very little attention to Racial classes.” More nothing.
“Very well. Your teachers—Hawks, all—were of a mind to allow you to stretch your wings on the streets. I believe they thought it would knock sense into you.”
“You didn’t come here to discuss my academic record.”
“Actually, Kaylin, I did. I assure you I seldom discuss things that are not of interest to me. That would be called politics,” he added. “And I see that you—”
“Failed that, yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m not going anywhere political. If you’ve read the records you know I’m a fiefling. I grew up there. I lived there. I probably broke a hundred laws without knowing I was doing anything illegal.” She had folded her arms across her chest, and she now tightened them. “I was born to the streets. I know them.”
“The streets of Elantra are not the streets of Nightshade. I’m certain your other teachers were willing to accept this rant at face value. Do better with me, Kaylin. I’m old enough to value my time.”
She stood up and started to pace.
“Don’t cling to your ignorance.”
“I’m not.”
“Don’t hide behind it, either.”
“I’m not hiding. Yes, the rest of Elantra is different. But people with power are the same everywhere—here they just have to be more clever about breaking the law. I’m not good with people who are above the law.”
“Or beneath it?”
“No, I understand them.”
“You’ve been willing to learn many things,” he continued, failing to notice that she’d left her seat. “You spent four weeks—without pay—at the midwives guild.”
She stopped moving.
“I told you, I do my homework. You also, I believe, spend time at the foundling halls—”
“Leave the foundling halls out of this.”
“—teaching the orphans. To read. To write. You could barely stand to do this yourself, and I cannot think that this is an overt display of aggression. How, then, do you explain it?”
“I don’t.”
He nodded, as if the answer wasn’t surprising. “Very well. Let us change the course of this discussion somewhat.” “Let’s not.”
He raised a brow over golden eyes. So far, she’d failed to annoy him; there wasn’t even a hint of orange in them.
“I am aware that teaching or learning are not the only things you do, at either the midwives guild or the foundling halls.” He raised a hand. “I am advisor to the Emperor, Kaylin. I am aware of the power you do possess. Sadly, so are the rest of the Hawks. Secrecy is not a skill you’ve learned.”
“Emergencies don’t lend themselves to secrecy.”
“True. Power does. Do you understand that you have power?”
She hesitated; the ground beneath her feet was shifting, and in ways that she didn’t like. She thought better of her need to leave the confinement of the damn chair, and sat again, hard.
“Yes,” he said softly, the tone of his voice changing. “I know what you bear on your arms and legs. I’ve seen the records. I’ve even examined them. I know that you’ve healed the dying, on many occasions. But I also know—”
She held up a hand, palm out, and turned away.
He was a Dragon, through and through. “I also know that you’ve used that power to kill. To kill quickly, yes, but also to kill slowly and painfully. I understand that the Imperial Order of Mages can at times be insular. I understand that their insularity feels like condescension. I will not even argue that it is anything else, in your case.
“But you are playing games with something that you don’t understand.”
“You don’t understand it either.”
“No,” he said without pause. “And it is because it is not understood that it is feared. You’ve treated this as a game, Kaylin Neya. The time for games has passed.” His eyes were still gold, but his lower lids rose, lending opacity to the clarity of color.
“The Dragon Emperor is well aware of what you faced in the fief of Nightshade. We do not name the outcaste, and because we do not, I do not believe it has occurred to the Emperor—or his Court—that you can.”
She frowned.
“Names have power, Kaylin.” “I … know.”
“Good. It is not to light candles that I have come—and yes, I am aware of what you did with the last one—although candles are a focal exercise that even the most junior of mages must master.”
“Why?”
“Because it shows us that they are in control of their power, and not the inverse. And for most, it is a struggle. You would be an object of envy for many of the students that pass through our doors.”
“I don’t want to pass through your doors.”
“No. And I think it best for the Order that you never do. I will be honest with you, because it is something you understand. We—none of us who know—are certain you can be taught. Do you understand this? We do not know what you are capable of yet. It is to test your capabilities that we have been sent.”
“Why didn’t they just—”
“Say so? It may have escaped your notice, but the Imperial Order of Mages is not accustomed to explaining themselves to a young, undereducated girl.”
“You are.”
“I have less to lose,” he replied quietly. “And I am aware, as perhaps they were not, of how much you have to lose, should we fail. Or rather, should you fail.”
This caught her attention and dragged it round in a death grip.
“Yes,” he continued in that serene voice. “Should you fail, you will be called up before the Dragon Emperor. The fact that you are, without question, loyal to the Hawks has caused the Emperor—twice—to stay his hand. I cannot think of a person for whom he has stayed his hand three times. If you cannot be trained, if you cannot learn to abide these classroom chores, these boring hours spent staring at an unlit candle wick, you will be removed from the ranks of the Hawks.”
“Will I still be alive?”
Sanabalis did not answer the question.
“Can I ask a different question?”
“You are free to ask anything.”
“Who else has he stayed his hand with twice?”
Sanabalis’s frosted brows drew closer together. “Pardon?”
“You said you couldn’t think of a person to whom he’d granted clemency three times. That implies that you can think of a person to whom he’s granted it twice. I mean, besides me.”
At that, the Dragon laughed. The sound almost deafened her, and she was glad she was in the West Room; nothing escaped its doors. “You are an odd woman, Kaylin Neya. But I think I will answer your question, since it is close to my heart.” She didn’t ask him which heart; she understood it was metaphor.
“Lord Tiamaris of the Dragon Court.”
Her jaw almost dropped; it probably would have if it hadn’t been attached to the rest of her face. Tiamaris, honorary Hawk, was so … prim and proper it was hard to imagine he could ever do anything to offend his Lord.
“Lord Tiamaris was the last student I chose to accept,” he added. “At my age, students are seldom sent to me.”
“Why?”
“I am the Court of last resort, Kaylin. If I judge a mage to be unteachable, or unstable, no one else will take him.” “Because he’s dead?” Again, the Dragon was silent.
“In your case,” Sanabalis continued smoothly, after the momentary silence, “you could have offended a full quarter of the Magi before you reached me. But because of the unusual nature of your talents, that was not considered a viable option.” He reached into his robes and pulled out a candle.
She wilted visibly.
“This is like, very like, Barrani,” he told her as he set the candle on a thin base and placed it exactly between them. “If you fail to learn it, you lose the Hawks.”
“And my life.”
“I am not convinced that they are not one and the same. I will take you,” he added quietly. “If you are wearing your bracer, you may remove it.”
Kaylin froze. Well, everything about her did but her eyes; they flicked nervously down to her wrist. Which was just wrist. The artifact, golden and jeweled, that could somehow dampen all of her magical abilities? Not there. She had a good idea where it actually was, too. “I’m not wearing it.”
A pale brow rose. “I believe the Emperor’s orders in that regard were quite clear.”
She swallowed. Being in trouble was something that she lived with; she always was. Getting the Hawklord into Imperial trouble was something she would almost die to avoid.
And Sanabalis was good; he didn’t even make the threat. She would have to watch herself around him, inasmuch as that was possible.
“I had to take it off,” she told him, swallowing. “Last night.” It wasn’t technically true, but it would have to do.
“Ah. The midwives?” His eyes were gold; one brow was slightly above the other, but he chose to accept her words at face value.
“They called me in. I can’t do anything when I’m wearing that bracer. I certainly can’t deliver a baby that’s—”
He lifted his hands. “I am squeamish by nature, I would prefer you leave the feminine nature of your nocturnal activities unspoken.”
She wanted to ask him to define squeamish, but thought better of it.
“Where is it now?”
“At home.”
“Whose home?”
She cursed. “Is there anything about me you didn’t ‘investigate’”
“No.”
And sighed, a deep, short sound that resembled a grunt. “Severn’s. Corporal.”
He nodded. “Very good. Get it back. I will overlook its absence, since you wouldn’t be wearing it during these lessons anyway.” He paused. His eyes were still liquid gold, and his expression had never wavered; there was some deep sympathy lurking in the folds of his face that she didn’t understand.
And she wanted it.
