Closet in the Attic

by Kenna Rose

CHAPTER FIVE IS FINALLY UP! :D I'm so proud.

5. The First Day

Author's Note: I'm so sorry I'm so late! I didn't mean to be. But I was busy with Girl Scout cookie season (Grr!), and right after that, I broke my thumb. Well, I didn't break it, really, but my cat bit it while I was giving him a bath. I was very careful through the whole bath, and Pony (full name: Ian the Pony, my cat. Another long story, too long for an Author's Note:) didn't manage to get a single scratch on me the whole time, but at the very end, when I was getting ready to start drying him off, he clamped on to my thumb, hard, and wouldn't let go. His teeth went in to the bone in four places, and it punctured through my thumbnail. And as you know (well, a lot of people know), puncture wounds have to be very well treated or you could get it infected and lose it, in this case, lose my thumb. I don't use my thumb that much while typing, true, but when I moved any of the fingers near it hurt too. It was so badly swollen I couldn't bend it for my life. A week later I could bend in, but it hurt ferociously to do so. Anyway, it still hurts, but I've taken off the bandages, and it doesn't hurt to type, just when you grab it or bend it far down, so now I'm typing. Yay. Anyway, this isn't some made up excuse, you can ask lee, one of my faithful reviewers. She saw it. Really, if I were going to make up an excuse, I would have broken more than just my thumb. Now stop reading this Author's Note:, and go read the other ones.

Author's Note: Well a lot has happened over this long period of time, including me finally reading Squire and Lady Knight (and many other books. .) So things'll be more accurate than they would have been before.

Author's Note: A lot of authors have a tendency to make their chapters longer when they're late, as an apology to the readers. This is a VERY long chapter, but it would have been anyway, even if it was on time, so it doesn't really count. What does count is I was finally going to add html to it, so it would be formatted properly, and look much better, and less amateurish. Unfortunately, it failed, and as result chapter two isn't looking so good.. I tried to fix it several times already, to no prevail, because things are MEAN! *Clears throat* Point is, I'm not in a good mood, but I tried, hard, and it's the thought that counts, right? /o.o\ Please? Maybe it'll be better, eventually.... Edit: Chapter's all fixed. ^^

Author's Note: This is the first and last time I will tell you when you're seeing the story from a different point of view. I usually don't tell my reader's because I think they can figure it out on their own (I always do, and I bet you can, too). However, I notice a lot of other author's doing it, and I wondered if I should as well, and decided not to lower my personal standards thus. But this one time, for the sake of an author's note telling I won't tell, I'm telling you that the first part's not from Kenret's point of view. That last sentence made sense, I promise. Think about it.

Author's Note: Look! I've use my first curse words ever in a fic (that I've posted on-line). But as a personal rule, I censor my on-line language, so bare that in mind when you see @ in place of an a, $ for a S, and ! for an i. (Or 7 for a T, or (for a c.). Just think |337.

__________________________Chapter 5: The First
Day_____________________________

Three boys were walking down halls to the pages' corridor, talking about their plans for the new year, and mentioning any of the new pages that they knew from childhood, or who's fathers were friends with their fathers. Then the topic shifted.

"Did you hear?" One of them asked to the other two. "There's rumors that there's *another* girl, this year."

"Yeah, I heard." The dirty blonde boy said, his blue eyes showing his loathing of it. "She's supposed to be some sort of relative to that d@mn 'Lioness'. I don't understand how the king hasn't exiled her out of the kingdom yet. Not only has he not done that, but he also made her King's Champion! I bet he only did because she found her way to his bed in the night."

"With a wife like that? Why would he care *what* that b!7ch offered?" Said a third speaker, brushing his bright orange hair out of his face.

"They weren't married back when he promoted that wench. He was courting Thayet, but maybe she wouldn't spread her legs 'til after marriage, even to the king." Said the one who spoke first, his brown eyes gleaming with malice.

"She lied to the royal family for eight years, and what do they do? Nothing! Not to mention that commoner she married that they suddenly turned into a baron. My Dad's thinking of moving to another country, because he's ashamed to be a part of this one." Said the boy with the red hair and hazel eyes.

"Speaking of other countries, you know that the only reason we're at war with Scanra is because they think we're weak. That's her doing, too. Who wouldn't think that a country with so many women fighting isn't weak?" Said the light brown headed, dark brown-eyed one, bolder than usual. Usually he didn't say much, incase Celdric didn't agree to his opinion, but with this subject he was comfortable, because they've had this conversation many times, and he knew the other two agreed.

"Aye, she's a bad role model on the young town lasses. Last time I tried to have a 'little chat' with one, she broke my nose. There's all these d@mn places for girls to learn to defend themselves, now."

"Oh, come off it." Said the blonde, privately disgusted of what his red headed friend would do with an unwilling town lass. "We all know we could talk about this all day, so what's the point? I've better things to do."

"Yeah, Celdric's right, Jyler." Said the lad with the dark brown eyes and light brown hair. "I say that instead we go find her room and thrash it!"

Celdric rolled his eyes. "You just like to trash things, don't you, Victroy?"

Victroy shrugged and said, "I've been reading all the name boards on the doors as we've past them. So far they're all boys names."

"You're an idiot, Victroy. These aren't where the new page's rooms are! They're all down there." Celdric said as he pointed down to the end of the hall.

"Oh."

As they walked they read, looking for the girl's room so they could vandalize it. They critiqued not only the names, but also the handwriting. Girls always had neat, curly handwriting, everyone knew that. None of the signs did. They all three held their breath a little as they approached the final door. None of the other doors held the girl's name, so this one must be it. Then, all of them sighed in relief, thinking that the rumors must be false, or else she left the castle to go to the convent before her first day, because the name, or rather, names, on the slate were both male.

"Ken/Tom?" Celdric said with a raised eyebrow, reading the simple, uneven scrawl. "Well, it's a boy, but he must be dense. Doesn't know his own name. And he can't even spell 'Thom' right."

Jyler and Victroy laughed, and the group made their way to lunch, no longer worried by the rumors.

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Tomora looked around her. She was in a small meadow, surrounded by tall trees that resembled purple asparagus. All around her was green grass, except when she bent down to look at it, they were really stout brown mushrooms. But when she stood up, it was once again grass. Now *that* wasn't unusual, not at all... Looking up again, she saw that her view of the sky was blocked. Little white birds, seagulls, or maybe doves, had come together wing-to-wing, in layers, forming a ceiling. They looked like they were moving on the side of her eye, but when she directed her gaze at them, they were perfectly still. This of course was impossible, because then they would fall out of the sky.

As if on cue, one of them fell silently straight down. From then on, every once in a while, a bird would fall, but there'd be no hole in the coverage of feathers, so that she could see the (supposedly) blue sky above. More birds always replaced the fallen. The rest stayed in unachievable place. Looking down from the roof of birds, she saw a castle about twenty feet away. It was a very cheesy looking, little kid cartoon styled one, with a box in the middle and two traditional towers to each side, all behind a wall that looked about ten feet high. It was a lame, unrealistic design, but it was made of real stone, not a drawing.

She approached it, globs of white bird dung also started falling every once in awhile, along with the birds. Luckily, neither of either ever landed on her, or even very near her. Then it started sprinkling rain from nonexistent clouds. The castle was only fifteen feet wide, and, she realized as she peered around it's corner, *two* feet long. And when she looked at the back wall, there wasn't one. There was no castle at all. She walked forward with her hands out in front of her, expecting to run into the invisible castle.

When she didn't feel any resistance after going ten feet, she had an idea. She took a step back, sidestepped to about where the corner of the castle had been, and took a step forward. And there was the castle to her side, as she expected. Going to the front, she reached over the three-foot high wall around the castle, opened the gate, and walked in the front door. She expected that her looking inside would make the castle go out of sight, but it didn't. When she took a step inside, the castle was no longer only two feet deep. It was *huge*. She glanced across the room at a strange looking fireplace and mantel. She decided that she was safer not examining it.

Instead, she headed to a curve staircase to her left. Almost to the top, she saw some one. She started to run up the steps, wanting to talk to the stranger, when the stairs performed a cliché and turned into a slide, causing her to fall onto her stomach and slid down, her shirt sliding up a bit, her belly scrapping painfully against the slope. When she reached the bottom, she didn't hit the stone floor as she expected. In it's place was a deep pit off water.

It was more of a lake really, with strange plants all around under the water. The castle and meadow was no where. She kept sinking, her attempt to swim up was doing nothing. She always naturally floated. She usually couldn't sink if she wanted to. And yet she was sinking at an unnatural speed. Down she went, able to tell that she was sinking only by the plants that grew in the dirt wall of the lake. The floor of the loch always the same distance away, She submerged unwillingly until she could no longer hold her breath. She knew she shouldn't let her breath out, knew that she'd only inhale water, but eventually got to the point where she couldn't take anymore abuse to her lungs. She pushed air out of her mouth....

And breathed in something perfectly breathable. It was different, felt heavy, and she knew she was really breathing water, not air, but none-the-less, it was all she could do. Soon, off in the distance, she saw an octopus in the distance, coming toward her very slowly.

She realized she wasn't sinking any longer, she was at the same level, yet she still felt as though she were sinking. She looked back at the octopus. Oops, her mistake, it was a squid. She watch it move in her direction. The squid was moving back and forth in an indirect line towards her, like a skier or a feather. No, not a squid, now it looked like a shark. Okay, she understood getting an octopus confused with a squid, but a shark? It was changing shape! She stood, at least she thought she was standing in the water, she could be wrong. The shark/blowfish/Oprah Winfrey/merman/whale was ten feet away, and then,

An alarm rang through her room. The sound caused Tom's heart to thump strongly in her chest. {Finally} she thought, and then she moaned, slapping her alarm clock's sleep button. {I thought that dream would never end. I *hate* dreams where I can breath under water. I wonder what about them just makes them scare the crap outta me...} The feeling she had when breathing underwater in her dreams was always much scarier than any of the rest of the dream. The shark hadn't scared her at all.

She swung her legs to the side of her bed, bringing herself to a sitting position. Then she groped to the back of her alarm clock to flick the switch to turn the alarm fully off. Rubbing her eyes, she forced herself up on her feet and limped over to her dresser. Opening the drawer dedicated to her page's attire, she pulled out a semi-neatly golden tunic from the right, and a pair of (shiver) scarlet hose from the left. In her armoire she found herself a white, billowy shirt.

She put them on, then went to her privy and examined herself in her full-length mirror. The hose was form fitting, and showed a panty line. That, however, was covered by her long tunic that went mid-thigh, so in didn't matter. She had altered the tunic yesterday. It had a very low, square cut neckline and had been taken in on the sides, to fit/show off her waist's shape better. It also had slits up the side, to her belt, and had no sleeves. Sure she'd follow the dress regulations, but no one said anything about altering them a teeny bit. Normally she wouldn't like such a low cut neck, but her white shirt went right up against her neck, and had a tiny rounded collar with two buttons that performed no task on it. It had matching cuffs at the end of the sleeves that ballooned out from under her tunic. The material of the white shirt was also thinner than she liked, but it wasn't so thin that it was sheer, it just showed a hint of peach from her skin underneath. There seemed to be no helping that when it came to white shirts... Some one should really fix that...

Leaning into her mirror to see closer, she put on her make up. Perfectly applied blue eye shadow, dark by her eyes, to light at her brow. Also, thick mascara, bringing out her naturally long lashes even more. They looked very thick, though in truth they weren't. Her hair she brushed and pulled back into a large white 'alligator' clip, having it fan out behind her. Along with that black 'tattoo' choker she had on, it made her look a lot prettier than normal, for some reason. That style just fit her.

Putting her lady-slippers on, she gave herself another look in the mirror. She looked very much like a girl. Perfect.

Then a knock came on her door. Opening it, she found a maid with a pair of hot water buckets in tow. "Yes?" Tom asked, before realizing that of course this woman was here to give her water for her to bathe in.

"Water for lady's bath." The woman needlessly explained.

"Um, yeah. Thanks and all, but I'm not going to take a bath today, I bathed last night, just before bed. I haven't gotten dirty yet. But thank you for bringing me the water anyway..." Tom rambled, feeling guilty for not telling the servants sooner. She had dragged them all the way here, after all.

"Yes my lady. Will I be building a fire for ye?"

"Oh, no, thanks. It's still summer, still warm, thank you for offering."

The woman simply nodded and left. Tom felt guilty, although she knew that the woman was simply doing her job, that the woman would just hand the water off to another page for them to use. She shouldn't feel guilty. But still, she hated burdening people, with no real reason why. Tom sighed, and decided to sit on the bed a read a book while waiting for the next bell to ring, signaling her to stand out side the door for a sponsor. Thankfully, now that the day had come, she no longer felt butterflies in her tummy. After a while, she got lazy and wanted to lie back on her bed, but didn't want to muss her hair. She settled for lying on her stomach.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

At last, the bell finally rang. Tom bent the corner of the page of the book she was reading, to mark her place. She slid off the bed and onto her feet. She stripped off her slippers and replaced them with her boots. She had decided to do this while she was reading, but never actually got off her lazy butt to do it. She did it because of her huge, gangly feet. They looked long and narrow in slippers. Maybe that was because they *were* long and narrow... Her boots made them look more normal, and also they were soft, worn in, and comfortable, so probably would be easier on her feet on the stone floors all day. Her tennis shoes would feel better, but they just didn't fly with the rest of her look.

She then went to the door and stood in front of it, waiting for Lord Padraig to arrive with his pages' in tow.

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Celdric walked down the hall behind the training master, with Victroy and Jyler to his left and right. Along with all the pages, Padraig stopped at every door where a new page was standing. There, he would ask the new page his name, and ask who would sponsor the lad. Then Celdric looked down the doors, at all the pages waiting for the group to get down to their door. Some were so small they looked as if the wind would blow them over. Others were giants that an earthquake couldn't have moved. Some he recognized. They came from respectable families. They were conservatives who agreed that girls should stay home. Some looked like peasants, looking around anxiously, not sure of what to do with themselves while they waited. Others stood perfectly still, hand to their sides, looking straight ahead. When he looked at the one at the very end of the hall, his jaw went slack. He quickly shut it again. It was *her*.

He nudged Jyler and Victroy with his elbows and motioned his head towards the girl.

"So she's the one who can't spell her own name. Probably because it's a *boy's* name." Jyler said. None of the three looked happy that they were wrong about there not being a girl.

"It's nothing to worry about, though." Celdric explained after a moment, calm. "Look at her. Pretty as a pansy. Won't last two days."

"Uh, no offense, Cell, but isn't that what you said about Fianola?" Victroy asked, cautiously.

Celdric looked at him furiously, as if he were going to hit him. He would've too, but not in front of Lord Padraig.

"*Don't* call me that." Celdric said instead.

The hatred and danger in Celdric's voice made Victroy flinched all the same.

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Tomora looked over the rim of her glasses as boys were receiving their sponsors. This wasn't hard to do, because she always had her glasses low on her nose. Always had them covering half her vision, so that everything below eyelevel was a different shade than the rest. In this case, blue.

Actually, it was several different shades, because the blue of her glasses went from loch blue at the top, to very light blue at the bottom, countering her eye shadow perfectly.

She watched as Henryk of Ambertill was claimed by Rian of Forestfog, Kirton of Aili was taken by Sorrel of Summer's Hay, and Giles of Shinog got Keithean of Crystalfalls. There were more, but they were too far away for her to hear. It didn't matter anyway, she was absolutely horrible at remembering names. Dates, too. To say the least, History and Geography weren't her best subjects. And now she was supposed to learn the history of *two* worlds. Tom sighed.

Then she felt as if being watched. Looking through the miniscule mass of approaching boys she saw three of them talking quietly amongst themselves, looking intently at her, judging her. Then the petite, hazel eyed, orange haired boy must have angered the blonde one that appeared to be the leader of the gang, because that blue-eyed boy gave Hazel Eyes an fiery glair and said something under his breath. She had no doubt that Blue Eyes would have hit Hazel Eyes in other circumstances. After another command, Blue Eyes, Hazel Eyes, and the other third guy to Blue Eye's right all took the next three available boys to sponsor. They looked like the type that would do a lot to get out of getting extra work. So why would they agree to sponsor a burden? Obviously because that way they would have a legitimate reason not to sponsor *her*, just in case. She sighed.

Finally Lord Padraig and his collection of ten-to-fourteen year old boys made it to the last door. Her's. She practically felt the blonde boy's gaze burn her skin. She looked up at him through the lenses of her glasses and arched her eyebrows, looking straight into his gaze. Then she realized that that was an even bigger mistake than she thought. Though she did like the way she looked when she did this, she looked very cool, she also made her look a little stuck up, as if she though she was better than them. Oh well, he was already her enemy anyway, it didn't really matter.

"State your name and that of your fief." Lord Padraig said in the exact same way he did for the male pages. Good.

"Kenret of Rio Rancho and Tomora of Pirate's Swoop." She said. She refused to pretend that she lived in only one world. She also almost forgot to leave off 'baroness' from the list. Nobody's titles really mattered here, and it would sound as if she were trying to brag, though just about everyone here was a higher ranking noble than her.

"I only see one." A thirteen-year-old who though himself clever said. Padraig ignored him.

"Who will sponsor Tomora?" he asked of the pages.

Everyone was silent. Tom waited a moment, and then started to count. She reached one hundred and twenty seconds, two minutes, then, "Gods! What am I doing here? What possessed me to think that I'd actually want to spend eight years with these boys?" Her voice was full of ridicule. She wished Padraig could just assign her a sponsor, but she was told that the boys had to volunteer.

"My thoughts exactly." Said Blue Eyes, malevolent. "So why don't you go home, where you belong?" Padraig acted as if oblivious to Tom's outburst or the blonde's cold retort.

"*That's* not what I meant. I meant that I shouldn't be stupid enough to go to a castle full of stuck-up, chauvinistic nobles! What, are you planning on just standing there forever? Wasting all our time? Is it really so bad to sponsor a girl? It's just, like, for a week or something? I think the king should kick all the men out of the castle training yards, have only female knights! Then, a hundred years from now, a boy will have to dress like a girl in order to be a knight, that'll teach you." then, to herself, she added. "Hey, that'd make an awesome 'fic!" Then she talked under her breath, quietly and gruffly, only words such as 'stupid' 'boys' 'guys' 'males' 'morons' 'idiot' and the like were understandable.

After she stopped, she realized that during the beginning of her, uh, accusations, a teenage woman had appeared down the hall. By that time the young woman was almost there. As she neared, she called out, "Lord Padraig. I've that favor you asked of me." and handed the man a parcel while brushing a short strand of very curly brown hair out of her face.

The same time the girl did this, a boy with black hair quietly offered to be her sponsor. Tom didn't trust he boy. He didn't *look* or act like one who wanted to drive her out, but as any actor knows, looks can be deceiving.

"Very good, Fianola." Padraig responded to the one who'd addressed him. The olive skinned girl let her brown eyes fall on Tom.

"She doesn't have a sponsor yet?" She asked of Padraig, though she was already sure she didn't. It was impossible to not here Tom's complaints, even from down the hall, and she hadn't heard the black haired boy's quiet offer.

"Well, Dustyn here has already offered to sponsor her."

"Could I sponsor her, if you please, my Lord?"

"Share with me what you think makes you better suited to sponsor her than Dustyn."

"Well, my lord, I can show her to the woman's baths and explain to her the few special rules we have. We can be in the same room as I teach her, unlike any of the boys'."

{That won't be true for long if *I* have anything to do with it}, Tom thought. {Or even if I don't, it'll still change.}

"Very well. Tomora of Pirate's Swoop, Fianola of Blue Harbor shall be your guide." Then he turned and faced his charges. "We will have breakfast, then you will attend your morning classes." He then walked through the boys, down the hall, around the corner, and out of sight. The rest of the pages all made their way to the dinning hall, the sponsors already giving their pages tips and warnings.

"Hello. Fianola, is it?" Tomora asked, not at all shy.

"Yeah, call me Fi. The dining hall is this way." Fianola said as she started to walk down the hall.

{Well I could have told you that. It's a dead end hall, that's the only way to go} Tomora thought to her self, but she kept it in, because instead she wanted to ask, "You're a page, right?"

"Of course, how else could I sponsor you?"

"I'on'know." Tomora said. "I just got the impression that I was the only current female training here."

"No, not quite." Tom expected Fianola to continue, but she didn't. Obviously the girl didn't talk more than she needed to.

"How old are you, anyway?" Tom asked.

"Almost seventeen."

"So you were too old, just like me?" Seventeen would normally be a third year *squire*, not a page.

"Yes."

"What year are you? Of page, I mean."

"I'm in my fourth year."

"Are you worried about the examinations you'll take before you can be squire?"

"No, not yet. I probably will be as the time approaches. Do you always ask so many questions, Tomora?"

"It's Tom. Yes and no. Usually if I'm in a talkative mood I'll talk to my friends about the latest game I've played or book I've read. But you wouldn't have any idea what I was talking about, so instead I'm asking you questions."

"Ah."

"Does it bother you?"

"Would you stop if I said yes?"

"No, but I wouldn't expect you to answer, I would just ask more and more while you stood there silently."

Fianola smiled. Apparently she wasn't completely void of emotions. Tomora couldn't think of anything else to ask, so she just walked silently to the mess hall with Fi.

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Fianola looked across the table at the new page girl. She was eating her small bowl of soup like a lady, tilting the spoon back so it wouldn't spill and she wouldn't slurp. She was all gussied up like a girl, too. And her hair went half way down her back. She didn't sit like a lady, by any means, though. The entire meal she either had her legs wide apart, or she had her legs crossed like a guy, thigh on top of thigh, not ankle in front of ankle. She also slouched a lot.

She'd never make it, she was too soft. Probably the only reason she decided to be a knight was because her great Lioness mother had wanted her to be. So far, none of Alanna's other daughters had come to the castle for page work. As she watched, the girl tired of the tiny spoon she had been given to eat with, and decided instead simply to drink her soup, bowl in her mouth, head back, but only after picking out all the tomato bits and putting them on a handkerchief, or rag really, that she kept in her purse. The rag was old, torn, and splotched all over with color. Maybe she didn't belong here, but she didn't belong in the convent either.

Now the girl across from her examined the remaining entrée, brown mush. Then she examined it closer by lifting up the small plate it was on and raising it to her eye. Fianola watched as Tom sniffed it and made a face of disgust. "Is this even edible?" She asked.

Fianola smiled and looked around at the other pages. "Nobody else seems to think so." she decided as she saw that nobody else was eating theirs either.

"Except that one kid." Tom said as she made her own inspection of the pages. "He seems to love it, he's taking and eating all his friends."

"I bet they feel fortunate." Fi said as she scrutinized her own dusty brown glob. Tomora laughed.

Fi sighed, ignoring the questioning look her temporary pupil gave her. She was worried about this girl. Not just for her, but for the sake of all lady knights. After her sister had dropped out just four months after becoming a page, she concerned over the reputation and image of female fighters all over the realm. They could handle one drop out, but if they had another one... She sighed again.

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Tom was bored. Fi never talked. They had eaten their breakfast in almost complete silence. She felt like she was going to burst. Normally, she wasn't quite so talkative, but today she was very hyper, with nothing to do. Not a good mix.

When Fi had first offered to be her mentor, she had a jump of hope that they could get a friendship together. She wanted a friend to hang out with, and to joke with. Having a friend to which to speak snide, gruff, sarcastic and argumentative remarks to was important. She hated not to share her jokes, so if no one was there for her to tell, then she'd say them out loud to everyone, including the teachers, and then find herself in constant trouble. She'd never have to visit Corus during her stay because she'd always be banned from leaving the palace. She frowned inwardly and sighed.

At last, the bell rang to signal the end of the meal. Tom stood up as Fianola gathered her dishes and started her journey across the floor to the bin where they belong until washing time. Tom didn't join her on her trip across the room because she had finish her breakfast long ago, and eventually, out of boredom, dropped her plates of early.

Instead, she reached out to her table and grabbed Mr. Ragg, who'd been laid out to dry on the table. She tested him to see if he was still too wet to put back in her purse. He was almost as dry as he was at the beginning of the day. He always dried fast. He was wet because she had dumped the tomatoes that were on him into a sink, then washed off the slime. It wasn't fair, Tortall wasn't *supposed* to have tomatoes, it was bad enough that they had onions. Foul foods like that should be a delicacy here. Instead, good produce, like lemons, kiwi, asparagus and the like where rare, when she'd prefer them too be common so she could have them all the time. Pah.

And what were they doing, having soup for breakfast, anyway? Soup is for lunch or diner! Wasn't that true, even here? Maybe they were yesterday's leftovers. The books always *seemed* to distinguish the difference between breakfast, lunch, and dinner, anyway. Or at least, breakfast, midday, and supper.

Tom stood by the double doors to wait for Fi to return. Although there was plenty of room for all the pages' to go through the doors without running into her, many did. She watched the culprits, trying to commit the offender's faces to her memory. If they were purposely running into her, than they were obviously among the ones who disapproved of her presence here. A few that hit her especially hard were later to find an in-grown toe nail, or an impossible to reach splinter, just under the skin and perfectly placed on a particularly strong nerve, so it would be quite annoying. Tom loved her gift. She didn't make it too painful though, all they did was tap her, after all.

Along came Fi, rubbing her hands on a handkerchief. "Alright. Off to the training yards. Come on, they're outside." {Once again, I could have told you that. training *yards*. Of course they're outside.} Tom kept her mouth shut with effort. Normally, she would have said it out loud, but she'd had a mean streak with her mom and Jonathan, and she thought that she owed it to be polite, for a little while. Also, she wanted Fianola to like her, and she didn't seem to like her loud, opinionated ways. To her, Fi seemed to be depressed by her. What was it about her that Fi was worried about?

Tom let her mind wander until they reached the training yards. It was quicker than she thought it would be, a shorter distance than she always pictured in the books. Also, the yards were *much* larger. More wasted space. She followed Fi and the rest of the crowd to the section dedicated to hand-to-hand combat. Fianola had already explain to Tom that usually Master Albinn of Sigis Hold was the one who taught them in these lessons, but whenever possible, like the time being, a Shang warrior or two would teach them.

She looked at the man leaning against the fence. She judged him to be about twenty eight to thirty two. He was tall and, of course, muscular. His golden hair was swept back into a small ponytail. Not all his hair reached that far though. The hair was a bit shorter on top, or just the same length but higher up so it doesn't go as low, so that wisps were escaping, getting into his face.

Sitting on he fence near him was a young woman with hair as dark of a brown as it could get with out being black. Unlike the man's, her hair was cut very short. With her judging blue eyes she glanced through the crowd of pages, measuring them up and picking out the new ones.

About five feet from the fence stood another guy, definitely at least in his mid-thirties, if not forties. His eyes were a slightly darker medium brown than his hair, which had a few grays in it, and were deep set.

The man in the field spoke. "Welcome to the palace, to those new recruits. I'm Albinn of Sigis Hold, your Master in hand to hand combat. Today, however, I shall only take the older boys while the Shang Snake, Kerrick Holmes and Shang Rabbit, Natalie Ferose take charge of the new ones."

"Alright, now, split down the middle." the Shang rabbit said to the clutter of remaining pages as she jumped from the fence to the front of he group. When she got to the middle, she stuck her arms into the crowd and kept them straight as she widened them to a one hundred eighty-degree angle. This made the pages' to separate it two reasonably even groups. Kerrick sacrificed his spot on the fence and came to stand in front of the groups.

"Now. Can anyone tell me what the first lesson is?" Natalie asked of the mass.

Some boys didn't look as if they had a clue, others didn't care, and some already knew. Tom, of course, knew, and said quietly to herself, "Falling. Rolling." with a slight roll of her eye.

Although she barely mumbled it, the Snake must have heard it because he said, loudly, "Correct." Then he repeated what she had said for the benefit of the rest of the pages who didn't have creepily good hearing. "Falling and rolling. This group, on the left, follow me." He said. Tom was part of his group. His group just moved a few yards away, so that they'd have room to work. Tom glanced at the Rabbit's group and watched her instruct the first boy and started to pull him down. He must have tried to pull her down instead, because he went flying over her hip.

"Ah, so you think I'm weak because I'm so young, do you?" The Rabbit asked the page. "Or is it just because I'm a girl that you decided you could take me?"

Tom wished she could hear the response, but Kerrick directed her thoughts back towards him. He didn't say anything that the people who taught Alanna and Kel didn't, and she knew how to do it, but she still paid avid attention. As her turn got closer, she stopped wincing for the fallen and closed her eyes, taking deeps breaths and calming her thumping heart. She didn't realize that it was her turn already when it came.

"You still awake, Pirate's Swoop?" Kerrick asked. Tom's eyes darted open as she mentally blushed, though it was just about impossible to make her physically blush.

"Yeah, sorry." she said, embarrassed. "I was just trying to settle my instincts. They have a tendency to make me do things I don't want to. They're very hard to ignore, and I was worried they wouldn't let me let you make me fall." She explained. The ten-year-old boys laughed at the way she spoke like her instincts were people.

Kerrick didn't laugh. He smiled and said "Don't."

"Sorry."

"No, I mean don't stop yourself. I would like it if *all* of you put up a bigger fight, made me work to make you fall. It will give me a better idea of what you know and are capable of." He shrugged. "And it's not as if the exercise will hurt me."

Now Tom shrugged. "You asked for it." She warned him. Now he did laugh. The idea of her taking him out was outrageous, even Tom thought so. He was a Shang warrior. He had been training since age four, at the latest.

{Yeah, well so have I} Tom thought. She stepped forward and Kerrick aimed a simply, slow, and obviously slap toward her middle with his left hand, to get her going. She, however, wasn't going to be slow. She grabbed his wrist just above his open palm with her own left hand and turned herself, gabbing her right elbow deep into his chest. With a normal opponent, this would have knocked the wind out of them. Kerrick seemed to hardly notice. He swung his right arm, hitting her in the ribs then grabbing her around the waist to pull her down. He didn't succeed. She gave a small hop while still in his arm, to bring her head down and her feet up, and hit him, *hard*, in the face with her knees. When he released her she landed neatly on her feet.

Oblivious to Tomora, all the new pages gasped or grimaced, including Natalie's group. Natalie herself had stopped teaching and was watching the fight with a broad smile.

Kerrick duck low and spun, sticking his leg out in a low kick meant to trip her. She jumped above it and lashed at him with her feet. Crouching low was a mistake for the tall man, it made him that much easier for her to kick. Her blows landed on him on his neck and collarbone. When Kerrick swung another punch with his right, he also kicked with his left, hoping to through her off and trip her when she blocked the punch. She duck under the punch, falling back on her hands like in a handspring or handstand, and coiled her legs to her to balance her for a moment before releasing them in a torpedo into his upper gut, lower ribcage.

Then for the first time she noticed that he had tried to kick her; she hadn't known when she coiled back. It didn't matter much to her, though, because it only knocked her right arm a bit and she'd come to balance already, so she didn't fall. All it did was cause her hand to scrap across the ground, the sand scratching it and stinging. She kept her feet going, so she'd land on her feet. She barely did, she had to take a step back to stay up, but she did stay up.

The kick did mean much to Kerrick. He tottered back. The crowd, including now the older boys and Albinn, gasped loudly as he swung his arms and tried to regain balance, but fell flat on his back. If he hadn't kicked, he would have been able to regain balance and wouldn't have fallen.

Tom stood up straight, getting herself out of her fighter's stance. She knew that she should go give him a hand up, but didn't feel like letting him pull her down with him. Thankfully, Natalie had come close during the fight to observe, and she now crossed over to Kerrick, helping him up for her.

For a moment there was silence, then Natalie told to Kerrick, "Now that was stupid of you. Kicking and punching at the same time? And what was with the spin kick? You saw that your opponent used her legs a lot. You got cocky."

"Aye, I was a little rash. But she's got talent. I believe she would have knocked me over, eventually, even if I had been thinking." To Tom, he said. "Good job, page."

"Never. Underestimate. A girl." Tom said. Not meanly or threatening, just with good humor and a smile, and a little flick of her hair. Like something from a lame Disney show or those crappy Mary Kate and Ashley movies.

Kerrick nodded, a smile penetrating his face as well. "I don't recognize you fighting style. Where did you train?"

"Uh, New Mexico? I'm a black belt in Karate and Tae-kwon-do, and, uh, two other ones I can't pronounce even though I've been studying them for years. I know, I know, it's sad, but... Anyway, They're the closest thing we've got to Shang in my world."

"So the rumors are true? You're the World Hopping Mage?"

"Aye."

He nodded again. " I notice you don't punch much. Is that just because you hadn't gotten to that yet, or just because you're no good at it?"

"Well saying that I'm *no* good at it is a little harsh, but yeah. I've got, like, *no* upper body strength, but strong legs, so, I use what works."

His head bobbed up and down. "Well, you did a good job. I expect you to do well. If you don't, you'll make us *both* look bad." He said with a smile. Tom laughed.

"I'll try my best." Then she said. "Why did you have to go and fall? I wasn't done yet. I was planning on sending you over my hip. It's been so long since I've last done that." He laughed.

"Perhaps another time. Now will you please fall for me? Just to verify that you can so that we can go on with the lesson?"

"Sure." Tomora said, and immediately fell and rolled, slapping the ground perfectly, but nearly coughing when dust got in her face. Then she took her place to the back of the line as the course continued. She washed the painful scrape on her hand with her rag and healed herself completely with her gift. Okay, so Mr. Ragg wasn't exactly sanitary, but in the real world she never bothered to wash her cuts, much less bandage them. She hadn't lost any limbs yet, so it couldn't be that bad.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Kerrick watched as the pages walked to another side of the training yard towards the weapons training court. The girl didn't smile at her victory at all. She wasn't proud of herself. Was that because she thought she still wasn't good enough, or because beating a Shang warrior wasn't worth pride, because she thought she was so much better. He sighed. Either way was bad for her. "I can't believe it. It's been so long since I've ever been forced down. And it was in less than a minute..." He mumbled.

Natalie came up and stopped beside him. "Yeah. She's pretty good. It's refreshing to see. I hope she does well." She put her hand on his shoulder and then laid her check on her hand. "Did you see the look some of those boys gave her? Pure venom. They hate her and what she represents. New ideas. Independence for woman." She smiled. "They're jealous of the attention she gets, as well. This'll be hard for her."

"But I *lost*." Kerrick whined, as if ignorant to what Natalie said. "To a *girl*." That earned him a jabbed in the ribs with her elbow.

"By that you better mean her age, not her gender." She said in a warning voice.

"Uh, uh, *yeah*, of course I meant her age. She's just, uh, so young" He said, teasing her again, pretending to be bad at pretending that he was referring to her age, not gender.

Twisting his arm, she leaned in to him and said, "Shut up and kiss me you chauvinistic hog."

He did as he was told.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Tomora made her way to the next patch of dirt disguising itself as a training yard. Fi had told her that next was weapons training. There, she'd probably get more bruises to go with the ones obtained from the Snake. She had healed her hand completely because the sharp pain would interfere with her grip in her next class, as would blood or the dull ache of a scabbed wound over hand. She didn't heal the rest of her, however. It felt so like cheating to rid herself of every little pain she got. Training to be a knight was supposed to be hard, it wasn't fair that everyone else was in pain and she was fit as a fiddle. She would probably always do this: leave herself with all the non-serious aches and pains she got. She probably shouldn't have healed her hand either, but it was too late for that.

Then Tom's thoughts sifted back to her battle. She was very pleased that her last blow had worked. Her handspring-kick was very difficult, and had a lot of variables. She had to use certain force on certain ground with a certain texture and level. She could use it on very few opponents. They couldn't be so small that they'd collapse with you on them, but they couldn't be so big that you didn't knock them back, because then you'd just bounce right of them and fall. She had wanted to use her hips for a flip or something too, but that was no matter.

She wasn't sure that she liked that she had beaten him. Not because of the unwanted attention the other pages gave her, but because he was a Shang. In Tammy's book the Shang were great, almost unbeatable warriors, with more tricks than you could ever learn. She had beaten the legend, the legacy. He wasn't exactly the Dragon, but, she still felt an unwanted realness in this fairytale world. She wanted it all to be amazing, be like a dream. She wanted it to be surreal, wanted to be awed. So far the only thing that had been unbelievable, made her mouth gape, was the complete ignorance of stuffy nobles. Beating a Shang was like finding out that Prince Charming was a complainer, or Cinderella was b!7chy at a certain time of the month.

She then went to remembering the look on what's-his-face, Celdric's, and his gang's faces. Victroy looked pretty mad, and somewhat worried, but she suspected he was just Celdric's yes-man. Jyler looked about ready to thrash out at her. Celdric himself looked odd, however. She saw the anger on his face, but when she looked at him closely for a moment and thought she saw something else. She saw a glimmer of appreciation, the anger acting just a mask. But how was that possible? You couldn't change some one's views on this so quickly, so he couldn't've had a change of heart and decided that girls could be knights, but everyone saw him as the head of the gang against her, before she even arrived, so it couldn't be that he had always felt that women could do good and just kept it to himself, for whatever reason. He was against her, her mom, and Fi. Against the queen and all her women. Then what was in that look?

She sighed a little, and then a train of thought was triggered on how often she sighed. Was it safe to sigh quite so much? Was it unhealthy or something? She never heard that it was, but you never know... Those new studies were popping up all over the place. As she pondered this thought, and others, like who was the first person to sigh and what made him do it, she was finally standing behind Fi at the weapons training yard.

She looked at the short black man that everyone else was watching. "Hello, pages. I'm Sergeant Obafem Ezeko, former weapons instructor to the Imperial Guard of Carthak and now serving the Tortallan crown as a member of the Palace Guard and as weapons instructor for the palace." Tom nodded. That would explain the beige and maroon uniform, but she still didn't understand why he was giving them his resume'.

"I, along with Training Master Padraig, will be teaching you the use of various weapons." {Really? Is that why a weapons instructor is here in a weapons class? I thought 'weapons class' was code for 'we are all here to study poetry'.} "First, we shall study staff fighting. Partner up and stand in line."

Tomora was happy that she knew how they did it in the books, otherwise, the instructions the teachers gave weren't nearly specific enough. She obeyed them with out argument however, she couldn't find the right words to phrase what was wrong with their ways of instruction with out making her sound slow.

She partially wanted to be partner to only Fi for the first few days, but more than that she wanted to partner a complete stranger. Besides, she wouldn't be allowed to have the same practice buddy for a whole lesson, much less a few days. She just hoped she didn't suck at staff fighting and/or got paired up with a nasty partner.

As the lines started to form, she tossed her colored glasses aside, just like in the last class, before sticking herself in the middle, partner-less, and waiting. Some one would have to work with her. She'd let them decide whom. Sure enough, when nearly everyone else was taken, along came some one. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to let them chose after all... The boy coming towards her was the same black haired boy that had belatedly offered to be her sponsor. He came and stood three feet away from her, standing straight and looking her in the eye.

She mirrored him. She too looked right into his gray gaze. She did it without challenge, with out competition, with out sizing him up. He seemed to do the same. He was about her age, maybe fourteen, and an inch taller than she was. Then Lord haMinch took their attention. He took two boys up and had them demonstrate a high strike and block, repeatedly, until the two other boys he assigned finished passing out staffs to all the pages.

Again, Tom paid close attention. If she were no good with weapons, she'd be no good as a knight. It didn't look hard, but that didn't mean it wasn't. She wondered if she would ever be able to practice in her free time. As she looked at the older boys, they seemed bored. The swords at their sides showed that they had already mastered staff, already moved on to fencing. They probably had done this drill a hundred times. Tom wondered why Ezeko didn't separate the older boys from the younger ones today. Most likely, there weren't enough new boys to do it. Also, they needed some one to set the example. Upon a blonde boy handing her her staff she studied it. It was four inches shorter than she was. It was thick and made of un-stained, unfurnished wood. She was pretty sure it was red wood, a nice, soft wood. It was void of decorative curves or images, just smaller at the bottom than at the top. She hefted it to get the feeling of the weight. It weighed just as it should, not tapped with iron or any such like.

She looked up back to the lesson just in time for Ezeko to tell them all to try it on their own, her side, the left, blocking, while the right side struck. {Why am I always left?} As the black haired boy moved to hit, slow and steady, in time with all the others, she brought her staff up to block, hands spread, palms on the bottom, thumbs locked, the right side lower than the left to protect her face, slower than she would have liked, but she had to keep up the rhythm.

His staff hit her's, right in the middle. He didn't do it hard. Actually, she thought he did a little softer than he was supposed to. She didn't think that it was because she was a girl, just because she was new to the staff. Her belief was confirmed as his blows gradually got harder. She liked that. She was pretty sure she liked him.

"Sorry I didn't volunteer to be your sponsor sooner, or anything." He said to her. It took a moment for her to realize that he had spoken, and another to realize that the speech had been directed toward her. By that time he had already continued, not knowing what to make of her silence. "It's not that I have a problem with girls or anything, it's just that I'm behind on my duties. I didn't think it wise to take you on. I kept thinking that if I didn't say anything, then some one else would speak up."

"Oh, don't worry about it." Tom said. Why was he apologizing? "It's not your job to volunteer. No body else did, either, so why apologize for not being better than they are? You're just average. The problem was, though, that everyone else also thought that if they waited, some one else would do it. That, and the fact that they all hate me."

He shook his head. "They don't hate you. Very few are against girls being fighters after all that has happened. And most of the ones against it don't actually care enough to fight against it. They think it's wrong, but they aren't going to do anything to stop it. And I *should* apologize for not being better than them. They weren't being average, they were below average, and so was I. I shouldn't lower my standards to their level. It's un-chivalrous."

Now Tom was sure she like him: that was the exact same thing she had been thinking, in slightly different terms, but keeping to herself. She nodded to Dustyn just as Padraig came to them. He reached in and corrected the boy's grip, then adjusted Tom's footing slightly, then moved the next coupling.

After a bit of silence, Tom asked, "How long have you been here?"

"This is my forth year as page."

"So you're taking you final examinations this year, too?" She asked.

His eyes widened and he shook his head a little. "Don't remind me."

She laughed. "Good luck."

He nodded. Quiet. Just the sounds of staff hitting staff and the quiet conversations of the other pages. During which time, Ezeko passed by them, giving them a nod of approval and going on his way. After more silence and concentration, the boy's blows making the wood crack, just as they were supposed to, she spoke again. "What's your name anyway? I can't remember."

Before he could answer, though, Padraig took up their attention. He showed them the proper way once again, and had them switch sides. She didn't know why they didn't just switch roles and stay where they were, but she obeyed.

"My name's Dustyn." He said, taking the opportunity to shake her hand before they took position.

Tom nodded to him as she raised her staff. "Kenret." She delivered the blow. Not as hard as she could, a little softer than she was supposed to, but he wood gave a satisfying clout that reverberated through the air to her ears and vibrated through the wood to her hands.

She repeated the move, harder this time. She got the force just right. Next, she tried to get it perfectly centered. Then again. Again. She paid attention to where her hands went. As she lifted the staff her right hand was at the bottom, wrist tight and curled to hold it up. Her left was in the high middle, palm on the bottom side, to aim and control it. As the momentum carried the staff over, she didn't need to work so hard to keep the thing up. She relaxed her wrist a bit, and shifted her left hand, bring the palm to the side or top half, and bringing it to the bottom, near her other hand, so the she could fine tune it, make it land right where she wanted it to, and she could push it down a bit faster, a bit harder.

She nearly jumped when Dustyn spoke again. "Don't get into the habit of concentrating too hard. It won't do in a real fight. You have to pay attention to your opponents blocks and blows, too, not just your own."

Tom smiled a little. "Okay." was all she could think of to say. Then she realized that she wasn't doing it the best way. She was using her right arm for the muscle work, lifting and swinging, because it was her strongest arm. But that left the left to aim, and her left arm wasn't as accurate as her right. She was too used to archery. When shooting a bow, you used you strong arm to pull the string. But staff wasn't like archery, because with a bow, the drawstring was also what you used to aim. All you left arm had to do was stick out straight, while your right one pulled back and angle the shot. In order to master the staff, she was going to have to build up her left arm. Not that her right was very strong or anything.

She switched her hands, and hit from the other side. Dustyn gave a small nod. She suspected that he thought she should do just that thing, but couldn't put it into the words to tell her with. Or he didn't want to seem criticizing. Or he just didn't know if she was left or right handed.

She whacked a few more times. Now that she had the hang of it, she wanted to do something new. {I have the attention span of a gnat...} she thought to herself as she filled her vision with the images of the other pages. Dustyn must have saw her mind wandering, because he asked, "Kenret, is it? Then why do the teachers all call you Tomora?"

She looked at him, her eyes flickering in a half-blink as her red wood rod knocked into his own thick stick. "Weren't you paying attention when sponsors were picked?"

He blushed a little and shook his head. "No, I was thinking about something else. I had already decided not to sponsor anyone, so I wasn't listening. I didn't know what was going on when you started yelling at us."

Despite herself, she smiled at her own folly. She mumbled, purposely loud enough for him to hear, "Stupid chauvinistic stuck-up noble men!"

Dustyn gave a little laugh and smiled. "Yeah, that was the one."

Still smiling, Tom finally realized she hadn't answered him. "You know I'm related to Alanna, right?" she asked him.

"Yeah. You're like, her daughter or something, right?"

Tom nodded.

"That's what everyone says, except, no one's ever heard of you before now. Thirteen-year-old daughters don't just appear out of no where. She had a daughter, named Tomora, even, I think, but she died in a raid on Pirate's Swoop when she was just a babe." Dustyn said.

"Are you sure?" she asked, tantalizingly.

He looked really uncertain. "Well, they say that, or she disappeared..." A thought spread across his face, excitement in his eyes. "That's it, isn't it? You were kidnapped by pirates!"

Tom resisted laughing at him. "That actually makes sense. And it would explain where I was and how I suddenly appeared. But no, sorry to disappoint you, but that's not it. I probably would have died if it was."

"Oh, no, I'm not disappointed. Why would I be? It's just, I just thought that maybe they took you for ransom, or something. Maybe you just escaped and found your home... Never mind, sorry."

Tom gave a laughing smile to him, and sighed inwardly because the first thing that popped into her head was what kind of fanfic that story would make. She needed to get a life, so she'd stop righting fanfictions about it. "Nope, none of that. Don't you ever pay attention? Snake called me 'the World Hopping' mage, earlier, didn't that tip you off?" She teased him again, just as Ezeko had older pages show them all middle strikes and blocks.

When the instruction were done, Dustyn said, "I heard him say that, but I didn't know what it meant. I was going to ask that next. Except you *still* haven't answered my *first* question."

After switching sides with him, Tomora just stared at him blankly, nearly getting hit as his staff flew towards her. What was he talking about? Something Ezeko said? Then she remembered what they had been talking about before just as she remembered to block his blow to her side. She did block, but didn't do it right. She moved her hands, holding the staff properly, and waited for him to swing again before answering. She had to prove to herself that she could do it right before talking. Luckily, the second deterring of his staff was successful. "I'm getting there, give me time. He said that because I'm from another world."

"What?"

"I'm from a different world. When Pirate's Swoop was attacked, I was one, and the only child there (I'm the first born) and Alanna used magic to place me in safety, in another world, and left me there, and was never able to find her way back to that world. She was in no condition to fight, so I think she shoulda just stayed there with me until she could gather her strength and take us both home, but she didn't think of that or something, because that's not what she did. She also coulda just transported me to somewhere else in Tortall, but instead she took me there and she left a portal in my house so I could go back home, but due to difficulties, the spell had to gather strength, taking a little from my mom's energy each day, for about nine years, before I could use it. My parents, or, rather, the folk who adopted me from Alanna, didn't tell me about this until I was thirteen."

"They kept it from you?" Dustyn asked, horrified.

Tom shrugged. "Yeah. I guess they just didn't know how to tell me. How do you tell an infant or toddler that kind of thing? Or tell a preteen or teenager that you've been keeping that kind of thing for them. They *should* have tried harder, I'll admit, but I understand their position."

Dustyn didn't look as understanding. He looked even less so when he asked, "They told you when you were thirteen? I thought that you were one when all that happened, and it took nine years. Wouldn't that make you ten when you could go in the portal?"

Tom nodded. "They didn't tell me before the deadline. They raised me. To them, I was their's. I found out about the portal, though. I went into the City of the Gods to become a sorceress, then I walked around wherever and became a merchant, a scholar, a healer, a gardener, a cook, a stable hand, a seamstress's apprentice, a waitress- Have you noticed that female things always end in -ess? How is that fair? Anyway..." About to list more of what she did to pass time, she stopped. He had discontinued chopping at her with his staff to stare at her, mouth open.

She waved her hand in front of his face and startled him back to reality. He shook his head and prepared to get back into time with everyone else. Tom felt bad. She hadn't meant to be bragging, just stating her life's story, as dull as it was. "It's really not that hard. With my magic, it was easy to make magical things to sell. I'm also good at buying for a low price and selling for a higher price somewhere else. My mom (in the other world) is good at frugal shopping 'cause we have no money, and I'm good at selling things for a higher price in other places thanks to the skills video games help me build. Every one from my world could be a scholar, just about, I have horses, I've got a green thumb, I'm good at crafts, including quilting and sewing and I'm a good cook, And it's not exactly hard to be a waitress. Really, it wasn't hard, I just did all of that because of my short attention span."

Though he managed to stay in rhythm with all the others, Dustyn was still staring at her. As instructed, they switched sides, then Tom sighed.

"Look, anyway, the point was that when my parents finally told me that I was the Lioness's daughter, I went to go tell Alanna and George. I had always wanted to go meet them, anyway. I also wanted to go to the castle, and also to meet Jon. Kel and Diane, too. I wanted to see Olau, Trebond, and all the other famous places."

"Did you?"

"No. I think some sort of magic diverted me until I was told who my parents were. I've tried to figure out why I was blocked from the things that interest me, but I haven't yet. It wasn't really a big deal."

Dustyn's eyebrows went camber. "No big deal? It would bother me! How do you know that the force keeping you away isn't evil?"

"I don't, but nothing's happened yet. Maybe it was just Dobby the House Elf's way of telling me that I mustn't go to Knight's School. Not that I could have, anyway. I didn't know I was noble until recently, and only nobles are allowed to be knights." She said, knowing perfectly well that she'd be the only one who'd get the joke, but saying it anyway. Who knows? Maybe they had J.K. Rowlings book here in one of Tamora Pierce's worlds.

They must not have, though, because he looked completely perplexed as he asked, "What?"

"Nothing, never mind. The point was..." She dwindle off. "What was my point again?"

"I don't know, but I've been waiting for you to get to it for some time now."

Tom's eyebrows knitted as she tried to remember how the conversation had gotten to here. "Man." she muttered, mostly to herself. "I hate it when I take so many side trails fromtheconversationthatIgetlost,OH!" She recalled what she was talking about in the middle of her sentence, so she rushed through it to get to the next sentence. "I remember now! My point was-"but she got interrupted again. Now it was time to learn low blocks.

When instructions were finished she still knew what she was going to say, much to Dustyn's relief, though this time he made note of it anyway, in case he needed to remind her. "My point was, that after I found my biological parents they told me that my real name, the name they gave me, had been Tomora. But in the other world, where I grew up, they named me Kenret. *I* prefer Kenret. I was *going* to go as Tomora here in Tortall, but for some reason it's always comforting to be called Kenret, so that's what my currently non-existent friends call me."

"Your 'currently non-existent friends'?"

"Yep. I don't have any friends at the moment, but if I do make any I will try to convince them to call me Kenret."

(A/N: Hi! It's me, Kykio. Guess what? Cookie Season's over! Yes, the time of year where us Girl Scouts get to stand in front of a store and ask every single person who walks out if they 'would like to buy some Girl Scout Cookies, or send some to military troops over seas?' just to get rude comments, bad puns, and other mean replies, to which we simply get to say 'Thank you for supporting Girls Scouts/Thank you anyway and have a nice day/night/life' for three, six, nine, or twelve hours shifts everyday for three straight weeks! You people are so rude! Anyway, that means I will probably have more free time to write my story in, and to study for my GED. Oh and why is there an Author's Note: in the middle of my chapter? Because this is how far I've gotten so far. :P Bye!)

"Can I be one of your non-existent friends, Kenret?" Dustyn asked.

To Tom that sounded like the lamest, most eye roll deserving thing. It sounded like Elementary school, where some one would come up to you and say, "Will you be my friend?". Even in Elementary School, even in *Kindergarten*, Tom hadn't like that. Even at four years old she knew that you couldn't just *be* some one's friend, you couldn't *agree* to enjoy each others company. Friendships needed to be built, not just become. But just like in fourth grade, Tom kept mouth shut on how juvenile it was, and just agreed to being some one's friend.

"No, you can't be one of my non-existent friends- you exist! That would mean that my friends, or friend at least, would exist. I'll let you be a friend, or an existent friend, though, if you're willing to settle for it."

Dustyn laughed. "I'll agree to that."

Tom nodded. They stayed silent until it was time to change sides. After that, they chitchatted about whatever. During this time, she learned that the magic class was Dustyn's favorite scholarly class, and weapons his favorite physical one. She learned of his family in Shaila, and he learned of both of her's.

Before soon, though, Ezeko took up all their attention, teaching them a new drill. First, the one on the right blocked the other's high block, then swung a middle strike, block low, hit high, defended their middle, then attacked low. In all honesty, it was just hitting and blocking back and forth, from top to bottom. Ezeko told them to switch partners, then start.

When Dustyn didn't move to find another person to practice with right away, Tom started to turn and venture off.

"Wait." Dustyn stopped her, and signaled to one of the older pages to come to him. When the lad came close, Dustyn just gestured to Tom and left. The boy correctly identified the gesture to mean that he was to replace Dustyn in Tom's practicing. Tom smiled in greeting, squinting a little in the bright light that the sun gave off as it came out from behind a cloud, though mentally she was shaking her head. Dustyn was protecting her, assigning some one he knew to her, so that Celdric or any others couldn't come and harass her.

"Hello, Milady." The sable haired boy in front of her said. Whether or not it had been his original intention, the remark egged Tomora to initiate the head blow that she was required to make. Also as required, the young man blocked the fierce force of it perfectly.

"Don't call me that. I'm not a lady. Not here or anywhere else." Tom said, more out of principle anything else. She wasn't actually irritated. but it was what was expected of her to say.

"Not even in that other world of your's?"

"It's good to see that some one was paying attention and knows where I'm from."

"Actually, I only know because I heard you talking to Dustyn."

"Oh, so now you're eavesdropping on me?" Tom replied in false offense.

"Come on, everyone in the training yard heard you! I could hear you, and I was all the way at the end. You have a very loud voice."

Tom smiled a laugh. "I know. I *do*. It kinda automatically projects itself a bit. I can't help it."

"You mean as in magically? It not good to left your gift run rampant like that." He said, a small note of fright hinted in his tone.

"No, not magically. Like in theatre, actors. You have to project from your diaphram when you do live theatre plays on a stage. Unless you use microphones, which I never do. Except, my voice always carried, was always loud, long before I ever learned anything about theatre, so, it's really just that way naturally, I guess."

"Oh, good. I wouldn't want any untamed gifts in the palace."

"Nope, you're safe. From me anyway. For now, at least."

"Are you avoiding answering me?" He asked.

"No and the answer is no. There *are* no ladies in my world, not really." She said. She wanted to add that it wasn't *her* world, she didn't own it, but she did think of it as her own world, here, where she was amidst people who didn't even know of it.

"No ladies? So... Are you a would-be knight in that other world, too?" he asked.

"Call it Earth, America, or something, and no I'm not. We have no knights there."

This surprised him so much that he delivered his blow belatedly. No one took notice, however, because there was no count or rhythm in the group anymore; everyone was going at there own pace. "No Knights? Then you have no army? Doesn't that leave you vulnerable to attack of enemies?"

"We have an army. It's more numerous than all the people in Tortall put together. We just don't have knights."

"So every civilian is enlisted?" he asked, stunned and somewhat horrified.

"Of course not! There's like, only, I don't know, five percent of our people in the military."

This time he did stop his arms training, and she had to stop herself mid-swing to keep her staff from hitting his unprotected body, knowing that he'd forget to block. "F... Five percent? But that would mean... Five in a hundred..." He stopped his calculations. "Your country must be huge!" He exclaimed.

Before Tom could answer, Ezeko called, "Stop dawdling, Pirate's Swoop! I'm not seeing any movement from you!"

With out turning her head from her partner, she called back in a loud angry voice that most the boys could hear, "Yeah, well, you're not seeing any movement from my male partner either, now are you? I find it interesting that you addressed me and not him, even though it's his turn to hit and I can hardly be expected to block thin air..."

Her partner got the hint and obediently in took his turn. "Shh! You shouldn't be so loud, he might hear." He said as he did. He didn't say it in a worried, scared, urgent or warning voice, just stating the obvious.

"So what? I don't care if he does, I meant him to, but I didn't say it loud enough. What's he going to do, anyway? I'm in the right! Lord Padraig heard me, and he didn't object. He probably has a lot more sense in his head." She retorted, for Padraig had indeed heard, he had only been three steps away, correcting an eleven-year-old's stance. As she told that he had heard, she looked up at him, his expression didn't change, and he didn't acknowledge that he had heard her either time, not meeting her eyes, but she saw the faintest glimmer of a humored smile flash-flicker in his eyes. He had heard.

The teal-eyed youth in front of her said, "Yes, you are, but he has more clout than you." He replied.

"Meh." Said the girl. "Who are you to be judging me?"

When the boy looked confused, trying to think of a worthy response, she clarified. "Don't be insulted. That's my way of asking you your name. 'Who are you'".

"Oh! I didn't understand. My name's Nond. Ashlin of Nond." This time there was no uncertainty at the half of a twitch of the Lord Padraig mouth as he bended in to her left, once again wordlessly correcting her footing. {Seems feet placement is going to be a problem with me} Tomora thought as the smile on haMinch's lips faded.

"Is that anything like Bond, James Bond?" Tomora asked Ashlin as she obediently turned in her toe and re-engaged her opponent. Then she remembered the lack of movie stars in Vhiliinyar.

"Who?"

"Never mind."

(A/N: I didn't do that on purpose, you know. I wrote this, leaving a blank in the space he was from, because at the time I couldn't think of a good fief. Then I wrote Kenret's response. Then, two weeks later(today), I finally decided the name of his fief, (one of the only ones whose colors I know) and entered it in. I didn't mean for it to rhyme with Bond. The pun was bad enough before. But I'm not changing it.)

For the rest of the lesson, Tom described at Ashlin's request the concept of movie stars, movies, what they were for, why they were so successful, and the like. The end of the lesson approached quickly. As she made her way to put her red wood weapon into it's bin were it belonged, looked at Fianola, patiently waiting for her to finish. Then, she caught the eyes of Dustyn and Ashlin. They smiled at her, and they, along with a few other youths with them, smiled and waved.

As Tomora let Fi lead her way to the stables, she was glad to know that she had probably made some friends. She had always been a loner, she liked solitude, she was anti-social. But non-the-less, she felt relieved. She hadn't known she was worried, but it made sense that she was. She knew she probably wouldn't make it eight years with out *any* friends. Once again her stomach clutched at the long commitment she had made.

When she was standing in front of the stables and everyone else had already gone inside, she opened a portal home. Ignoring the surprised outcries of some of the pages who saw the opening in time and space, the big hole into nothingness, she just stepped into it.

Back in her attic, Ken waited for her eyes to adjust to the dusty noon light sneaking in through the air vent in the wall that led to the front yard, then she pushed down the stairs and made her way down to her back yard. Once out, she scrambled over to her own stables, happy with herself that she had made sure that it was day and she was home alone before going into Tortall the last time, so that it would be the same now when she came back to get her horse.

Once in her yard and in her own stable, she looked over the horses she had to choose from. Moonlight was too small. Besides, she was named after Alanna's horse, and it didn't make a lot of sense to bring her. Khan'Garrahd (A/N: The spelling's wrong, but the book it's from is currently lent to a friend, so I can't check it.), also from a book, was a bit too wide for her legs and didn't always listen. She loved rebellious horses, but they wouldn't do in a class.

Tides of a Pyro's Gale, or just called Weed for short, was a good choice. The horse was white on her back, then it bleed into a bluish gray in her middle, then a very red tinted roan on the legs, which each had a black sock; the back right leg's a very short sock, and the other's were longer than on normal horses. This mare was a beauty, with it's very unusual coloring. Kenret thought that when she was the right age, Weed should breed with the finest, most recessively white horse, so that the offspring would look just like her. Unfortunately, the odds of that weren't high. Weed wasn't a fine horse, so people were hesitant to breed their stallions with her. She had unusually long legs, made for speed, but had a low stamina. She could go fast, but not for very long. She couldn't even go at a medium pace for long. Also, she had raggedy hair. The hair on her body was quite inconsistent, all of it different lengths. Her tail was long and soft, the nicest horsetail she'd ever felt, but her mane stuck out at all angles, and couldn't be tamed. Kenret had even tried gel and hairspray once, to the horse's displeasure, but nothing worked. This hair was what got her her nickname of Weed. That, and the fact that her official name had every natural element in it but earth; it only seemed right that her nickname was that of a plant.

(A/N: Oh please, who am I kidding? I don't even know why I'm bothering describing the rest of the horses... After the long description of Weed, it's kinda obvious which horse she'd gonna pick, don't you think?)

Next in line was Cowboy, the dusty brown gelding with a white muzzle. After him were Shadowdancer, Darkness Of The Light, Hope's Glimmer, Hippo, and Mage's Breath. There was many more, but these were the only ones that were only her's, or that were the whole families. She didn't want to take the horse of one of her family members, or one that she only shared with one or two siblings.

Cowboy and Weed were probably the best choice. They were the best size, obedient, well trained. Cowboy was probably the one she should take, he had more stamina and was friendlier with strangers and other horses. But, non-the-less, Weed was just *so cool*. So knew she shouldn't be having favorites, but she did. Weed was cool, had personality, was unique. Cowboy was just as plain and ordinarily common as his name. He had no spirit. Also, he was the shorter of the two. He was also the best height for her. But she didn't want the best height, she preferred tall horses, like her leggy Weed. And Weed was faster. She made some excuse or another to convince herself that Weed was the best choice, then started to get her tack.

She got the cleaning and grooming gear, the bridle and reigns, the saddlebags, the saddle blankets, the saddle, and everything else needed for horse care that wouldn't be provided for her. She knew she had a great saddle in Tortall, but there was no telling whether or not it was the right size.

Kenret carried some of the tack, and put some in the saddlebags that she then put on the horse.

"Come on, Weed" she said comfortingly. "This is going to be strange, but it'll be alright." She then pulled the tall mare towards the house by her lead rope. When she got to the front door, she opened it wide and stepped though, then tried to convince the horse to follow.

Weed would have nothing to do with the door. She pulled hard against the lead. Once the latch of the rope came undone and Weed pranced away. Ken had to chase after her for a few feet and put the rope back on, much much tighter than she liked to. She felt guilty, but Weed just wasn't cooperating. Another time Ken hand had slipped, giving the mare another chance to run. Ken wasn't sure if she would have been able to catch her again, since the horse would try harder to escape the next time, but she didn't have to find out. When Kenret's hand slipped, she managed to grab the rope again before Weed noticed. Or maybe Weed chose that minute to agree with Tom. Either way, instead of running, she stayed still until her leader was regained, then compliantly followed into the house. The excursion felt as if it took ten to fifteen minutes, but in reality it only took four.

Kenret shut the door firmly and sighed. "I didn't know you didn't like doors, Weed. Unfortunately, that was the easy part." With that she left the horse in the entryway, and went to the kitchen. She knew she could leave the mare there, it would either stay were it was, follow her into the kitchen, or wander into the living room.

In the kitchen, she dropped the stuff she was carrying into the table, then went the refrigerator. From there, she took a carrot, and an apple. From the back of the pantry, where they were buried, she picked three sugar cubes from their container that they bought for the horses' Christmas present. She needed goodies to convince Weed to forgive her later. Pulling hard on the rope and pushing the horse gave the horse a different attitude toward her. Weed was scared and intimidated now, not thinking of Kenret as a friend, but a mean, scary discipliner; master.

Picking the horse tack back off the table, she went back to find the horse. Weed must have wondered into the living room, because she wasn't in the entry. Looking into the living room, she wondered how she could manage to lose a horse in a closed environment. Or maybe Weed had just turned invisible, because Ken couldn't she her on the living room, or down the hall. All the doors down the hall were closed, except the bathroom door.

(A/N: You know, I didn't realize until just now that Weed was a bad name. I didn't make the connection with drugs. When I hear weed, I think of the pesky things in my garden. And the entire rest of New Mexico. By the way, *DON'T* move to New Mexico. It sucks. All of it. It is not beautiful, that's just an illusion. Stay away. Anyway, I'm not changing the horse's name. I've already become fond of it. That's the reason Kenret's horse IS Tides of a Pyro's Gale. Originally, Ken was going to choose a horse called Void, but when I started to describe Weed, I got too much into it. *sigh* Oh well, Void will just have to appear some other time.)

Though she didn't expect to find Weed in there, she went ahead and looked in the bathroom. Sure enough, Weed was in there, dinking water out of the toilet. Len shook her head at the sight and said, "I swear, you guys act as if we never feed you. Now come one, walk backward into the hall, but be careful to turn your body, so you don't hit your rump on the other wall of the hall..."

A took a bit to do this maneuver, than another bit to get the horse out of the hall backwards, because, unfortunately, the confused mare backed out with her rear to the living room. During which time, the phone rang, but Kenret couldn't answer it. After she got her horse out, and tied the leader to the posts of the stairs, she went to check who it was.

It had been her mother, Merry. Just as Kenret picked up the phone to call her mother's cell phone, the phone rang. She didn't bother checking the Caller ID, she just pushed the [TALK] button and put the black phone to her ear. What was the worst hat could happen? If it was a bill collector, she could just honestly say that her parents weren't home. It wasn't a bill collector though, it was her mom. After rushing through a conversation where her mother made a list of all the stores she had gone too, the great deals she got, and of the stores she was going to now and why, she hung up and untied the lead rope from the stairs, leading the horse up them.

Thankfully, Weed didn't have as big of a problem the stairs as she had had with the door. The raggedy mare made her way all the way up, slowly, and with only a look of startled protest on her face.

"That was a lot easier than I thought it would be, thank you, Weed. But now comes the hardest part." Ken said to her, petting her on thanks. As she led her mount down the upstairs hallway, which was lined with bedrooms, she shut the doors, just in case Weed decided to sprint. At the near the end of the hall, she grasped the rope more tightly, and pulled down the stairs to the attic.

As Kenret suspected, Weed was quite apprehensive of these new stairs sprouting from the ceiling. And if Kenret had hoped that Weed would cooperate as she had before, she was very, very mistaken. As she had guessed but hoped against, the mare did not like these new, steeper, narrower stairs. They also had no railing s, so Kenret was very careful not to let Weed fall, and this took a lot of work. Twice, the horse got away to run down the hall, once even placing her front hooves on the top most stair leading downstairs, then being uncertain how to continue. Twice, Kenret wondered if she really had to be such a perfectionist, really had to take Weed to Tortall, and not just get any old mount that was already IN Tortall. Oh well, she had already gotten this far, she was going to finish it.

After the paranoid horse was just about at the top of the stairs, Kenret braces her self for the hardest part of all. The stairs connected with the ceiling/attic floor at an odd angle. An angle of which was hard for the horse. Kenret got smashed and tugged, had her right foot stepped on twice, but manage to get the horse up.

After a sigh and a few exhausted deep breaths, Kenret pulled the stairs back up so Weed couldn't accidentally take a wrong step, and once again took the horse's lead. She tied the rope to the doorknob of the closet, after first shutting the door to it that she had originally left open, then she opened the stairs again, to get down and gather the tack she had been forced to leave down there. The entire time she was down there, she was certain that Weed would come crashing down on her, having gotten loose.

Weed hadn't gotten loose, though, as Kenret saw when she returned. Again, she closed the stairs. Then she untied her horse and scooted her back for a moment so that she could open the misplaced closet's door. She then opened the portal into the yard in front of the Palace's stables.

Kenret was very careful in her crossing to Tortall. She walked into to the Nothingness, pulling with her hand what she hoped was Weed's rope. You could never tell. In here, in the Emptiness, all was black. But it was all color, too. And all white. It was impossible to tell, impossible for her mind to gather. She couldn't see anything, but she could see herself. She could see herself with her own eyes, she could see her own eyes. She watched her self from all angles. From above, from below, miles away and close enough to see each individual cell of her body. She could see what she looked like on the inside, as well.

She could see her horse as well, in all the same ways. She was sure the horse saw the confusion she saw. Saw the things that flirted on the edge of all her vision, the things that seemed to be the physical for o dreams, of memories, of though. Also, the things that looked like the little spots you saw when your eyes were adjusting to the light, or when you rubbed your fist into your closed eyes. She could feel everything, yet was completely numb. She could feel her baffled horse shiver beneath her hand, though her hand was on the rope, not the horse.

She stayed in this dimension for much longer than usual. She walked and walked, until she had to be at least forty feet away. She never ran into a wall, never reached the end of the closet. This path was endless, until one made an end. It felt like ~The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe~.

The reason she walked so far was because she wanted to make absolute sure that her horse was fully in. If she walked in only as far as she usually did, only half the horse would be in the closet, so only half the horse would end up in Tortall, and that just wasn't an experience she wanted. She didn't want to kill her favorite horse.

{Not that I want to kill *any* of my horses, or anything. I probably should have tried this out with an inanimate object first, to see if it would work...}

She knew her worries were for nothing, though. They were the same types of worries she got when going on a particularly scary amusement park ride. One were she *knew* the cables weren't going to snap, she *knew* she wasn't going to be the one person of hundreds whose cart falls to her doom, but non-the-less, there was always that first time, always accidents.

Satisfied that the horse was thoroughly in, she opened the portal to Tortall. Usually, she just stepped into Tortall. This time, she had to walk into Tortall and trail a horse behind her. This was much harder than she thought. It was hard to hold open the brink of reality for than a split second. Non-the-less, she managed to do so.

Everyone was staring at her. One moment, they saw her standing there, not going into the stables like the other boys, then she tore a hole in the air into a strange place, without moving. Then very next moment, there she was, a couple feet away and facing the opposite way, with a horse behind her and tack in her arms were they hadn't been before.

Tom sighed, then walked her horse into the stable. Ignoring the looks. She hadn't meant to draw attention. In the stables, she looked for a stable hand. She expected to find some eager boy or teenager taking care of the horses. To her, the stable hand was the equivalent to the McDonalds worker, a temporary job for the poor teenager. The reality that people didn't often change jobs in this world came to her when the only wrangler in site was a blond haired, red-faced man with light blue eyes who seemed to be about in his forties. Or maybe fifties. Or maybe more or less, Tom was horrible at guessing ages, it was amazing when she was right, like she had been with Fi.

"Excuse me, sir? Could you help me? I was told I had a stable ready for my horse. It should already have a saddle in it, and a few other things, I think."

"Och! I ain't no 'sir'! I be just Stefan. Aye, I think I ken which one yer talking of. Right this way, lassie."

"Oh! *Your* Stefan? I didn't know that! I was going to have ye-you direct me to him later. To you later. But now I don't have to, 'cause your you! Or you're him. I forgot you were blonde; before the PotS books I always pictured you with brown hair. I don't think they ever mention your hair color in the Lioness"

Stefan had stopped leading the way to her stable before he even started. Instead, he jumped back when he was startled by the confusing loud youth. "Ob! What's all this ye be yapping about? What's-" He trailed off, unable to form a question out of her gibberish. Horses were so much easier to deal with!

Tom gave a small laughing grin. "Nothing, never mind. I just wanted to thank you for helping my Mom and Dad communicate with each other while she was in the castle and junk. Now where's my stable?"

Stefan peeked at her from beneath eyebrows that were lowered in confusion for a moment before saying, "No problem. I believe it's right over there." He wasn't sure how much he liked the wee lass knowing so much about him, but he knew that George wouldn't've let anything slip to his daughter, so he knew he was alright.

Tom nodded and made her way to the stable near the end of a line of them. "Thanks Stefan. I'll talk to you later."

"That's what I'm afraid of." The muttered, not bothering to keep his voice too low for her to hear. Then, glancing at her horse for the first time, he said, "Speaking o' which, what's the matter wi' yer mount?"

Tom, not catching his meaning right away, said, "What? You mean her coloring? That's just what she is naturally..."

"Nay! Why is th' puir beast all affright?" He expected the offspring of George and the kind, if temperamental, Lioness to take better care of her mount!

Tom, who had realized what he meant by his question just before he specified it, said, "Oh, I know! The poor thing. But she'll be alright, I promise. She's not hurt, just a little shaken up. She didn't like the trip from the other dimension."

Stefan nodded a little, as if he almost understood. "She's mumbling about ye being mean to her, and taking her *through* a strange place *to* a strange place."

Tom looked at Weed, worried. She expected her to be shaken up, but she didn't like the idea that her horse thought she was mean. Though, really, she had expected that, too. She had had to be stern, though, pushing Weed up the stairs and through the door. Maybe she'd been *too* stern. Or maybe it wasn't that that convinced the horse she was mean, maybe it was just the Nothing-/Everything-ness that did it.

"Oh, I bet she thinks the same thing whenever we drive her in the trailer to a horse show." Tom turned to her mount, rubbing her muzzle. Her expression saddened as Weed pulled away from her touch a bit. "Ah, I'm sorry girl. I promise I won't make you do it again. I just wanted to be able to spend some time with you while I was here, that's all. You'll be alright, right? You'll forgive me?"

Weed had surrendered to her touch, and snorted a little at her question. Tom took it for a yes. With more comforting words, Tom reached into her pocket and gave one of the sugar cubes she found there to her.

At her stable she found her mother's gift of a saddle and various attachments for it, to make it more useable for fencing and other forms of fighting from horseback.

Working twice as fast so she could catch up with the boys, she gave the horse a saddle blanket and a cushion on her back. Then, holding the girth straps out of the way, she tested the new saddle to see if it would fit. It didn't look like it would, it looked to small, but she tried it anyway. As she lowered the saddle to the horse's back, it became apparent that it was far too small. Then, it seemed a little bigger. Then bigger. Then entire descent it seemed to change shape, getting bigger, forming itself to the horse's personal shape. When the saddle finally landed, it was the perfect size for the horse.

{Magic. Of course it's magic. Why did I expect anything else?} she thought.

She didn't have any time to think about the saddle, though, because Fi came up to her and said. "No."

"What?"

"Don't saddle her. Your supposed to bring your tack out to the yard and put it on the horse while Padraig watches you, to make sure you know how."

Tom stopped what she was doing. "Oh. Will I need my combs, too?"

"Yes."

"Ohhh-kay." she said, making the word a four syllable one, then gathered her things and quickly led her horse outside with the other boys.

While the older- well, actually, they were the same age, but while the more experienced pages worked on other assorted things, practicing tilting, archery, and swords play from horse back, the new pages showed their skills to haMinch. The put the tack on, took it off, and put it on again, for those who hadn't gotten it.

Tom peeled off the saddle and blankets from the horse and put them on the fence. She brushed under where the saddle was and wondered what to do. Padraig had given them no further instructions for what to do after they'd done unsaddling again, and he was to busy to give them orders now because poor Kirton was having difficulties with a girth strap.

Tom decided to re-tack her horse. After all, no matter what the pages were supposed to do with their horses next, it would have to be from horseback. As she got ready to put the rains back on, Ashlin rode by. He dismounted, tethered his horse, then went to put his lance away. When he came back, he had a bow and a filled quiver in his hands, which he put down to begin taking off the tilting gear of his horse to replace with standard gear. Apparently he had tired of the lance and with now moving to archery.

He stopped for a moment to take a quick swig from his canteen. Looking across the whole seven or so feet that separated them, he said the Tom, "You need to knee her."

"What?"

"Your horse. You need to knee her in the stomach. She took in a breath. As soon as you tighten the girth in your hand, she'll breath out and you and your saddle'll fall right off."

Tom rolled her eyes. Like she didn't know that. "No I don't."

"Fine. I'll volunteer to assist you to the healers."

"Please. Like they'd send me to the healers for falling off a horse. That's not exactly a long drop, you know. Besides, I am a healer." {Sorta}, she added to herself.

"They will after your head hits a big rock and you're in no condition to use you magic."

Tom ignored him, unable to think of a good comeback. Instead, she untied her horse from the fence and walked her in a small circle. Ashlin watched as she then tightened the girth. "See? Walking your horse in a circle makes them let go of their breath. Then you just tighten the strap before they take in another one. Works just as well and is nicer for the horse."

"Kneeing them doesn't hurt and it's faster."

Tom stuck out her tongue at him. "Too bad. I'm doing it this way."

Ashlin just shook his head. Done with her task, she sat on the fence her mount was tied to. When Ashlin was done with his own, he gestured to a Padraig who was almost done picking on Kirton, and made the excuse of not wanting to get caught not doing anything, and left.

Finally, Kirton got it and everybody got mounted. They practiced walking, trotting, cantering, a galloping. Then they practiced doing it all in a single file line, on a narrow path, staying with a certain distance between each horse. At least, that was the plan. Each time they tried to canter with a horse's distance between each horse, some one or another broke the line, either too close, too far, or completely out off the path and out of control. At one such time, while everybody had stopped, Tom struck up a conversation with Kirton about riding. She hadn't been paying attention when an irritated Ezeko, who Padraig had traded roles with when he began to get agitated, had finally made his way to her after realigning each page into place. Tom hadn't heard when he addressed her to get into place.

"Pirate's Swoop! I said get into place!" He screamed. Her eyes widened and her eyebrows went up as she cocked her head to the side, and began to move into place, her opinion of his overreaction very unambiguous. This did not help Ezeko's mood.

"I said *now*, girl! Both hands!" He raged as she only used one hand to half-heartedly move her horse into place. It seemed obvious to him that she was purposely taking longer to do as she was told, to rebel against him. When she didn't move her other hand to the reign, he was furious. He grabbed one of the reigns and pulled it towards the path, to try to make the horse go faster.

Unfortunately, Tom hadn't been slow on purpose. The moment Weed felt Ezeko's pull, the mare reared, flailing her hooves. Ezeko's own stead shied away, staying back a few feet. Tom managed to stay a-horse, even as her head slammed against a branch of a tree that hand been just behind her. The only reason she stayed on her seat was the branch just below the one her head had hit, because it jabbed into her back, sandwiching her between it and her horse, blocking her breath considerably, until Weed regained her footing. When all the horse's four feet were back on the ground, Tom was in a painful position. One foot had fallen out of the stirrup, the other had gone *through* it's stirrup, the leather reaching up to mid shin. Her stomach lay across the saddle horn, which dug deep. Her mouth had some of the horse's mane in it, and she had let go of the reins. After all, if she had hung onto them, gravity would have caused her to pull down on them, hurting her horse's mouth more. Instead, her forearms were crossed in front of her face, on the mare's neck.

As soon as she sat up, before she managed to get her feet organized in her stirrups, she glared a Ezeko, subconsciously realizing that all the pages who hadn't looked up when Ezeko yelled at her the second time, looked up when the horse reared. "What the he|| is *wrong* with you!? Are you mad? You don't go around grabbing other people's horse reigns, unless they're unconscious or ask you to or, or *something*! If I'd been standing in front of a river or canyon I'd be dead!"

Though Ezeko obviously *did* regret his move, he wasn't about to admit it. "Don't you take that tone with *me*, lass! I'm not Padraig, you won't get away with treating me like that! You *will* give me the respect I deserve!"

"I *am* giving you the respect you deserve: None! Padraig, on the other hand, I have plenty of respect for, and I don't even know him! I bet he'd have the common sense to-"

"I barely touched your d@mn horse's reigns!" he interrupted. "Don't go blaming *me* because you beast has a weak mouth! Next time you'll do as I tell!"

"You yanked on my horse as you would your own! It's *not* your own! *My* horse is *neck* reigned, not bit reigned! It's steered by the feel of the reigns on it's neck, not the feel of the bit in it's mouth! I'd never be so cruel as to-"

She was interrupted by the hour bell, signaling the time for them to go to their next lesson. Tom untangled her legs and dismounted to examine her horse's mouth. Although she spoke in a louder than normal voice, it sounded like she was whispering after all the yelling and the dominating sound of the bell still ringing when she said, "Her mouth is bleeding..."

When the bell was done, Ezeko spoke again, but slightly calmer and not to Tom. "Alright, you lot! You know what that bell means! Off to your baths, and you best not be late to lunch!" Then he stormed off on his horse, and all the other pages sighed in relief. Tom figured that that was a traumatizing first day for them.

{Well, at least I know they'll never forget who I am. They'll remember their first day of training for the rest of their lives.} Tom lingered on rubbing her poor horse's muzzle for a moment before she mounted back up and trotted Weed back to the stables.

At the stables she took care of her horse and her tack. She used her gift to dull the pain of her horse, and to stop it from bleeding. Then she stepped out side the stable, to see that Fi was done already and waiting for her.

"Hello. Now what?" Tom asked.

"Now we go to the woman's indoor baths, while the boys swim in the 'Hole. After that, we go to lunch. Go to your room and get your things, and meet me there."

"First: I don't know where 'there' is, you're supposed to show me. Second, if I'm going to go all the way to my room to get my things, way don't I just take a bath there and save myself some work?"

"Fine, I'll go with you to get your things. And the servants have better things to do than to make sure a page has warm water in his room everyday. Unless you expect the water to magically appear in your tub?"

{No, but out of a facet would be nice...} " Or her room. Fine, I'll go to the bathhouse. Where are your things, don't you need to get your things, too?"

"No, I have a maid take them to the baths for me." Fi said. To Tom's cocked eyebrow she said. "It's a personal maid, that I pay, not a normal servant. The normal servants have better things to do, but mine does not. It's her job, what she's paid for."

"That makes perfect sense. All except for, you know, the fact that instead of having her make sure your cloths are there everyday, you could have her make sure that there's water in your bath, and you could save yourself some time." Tom replied with a twinge of sarcasm.

"Stop making everything so complicated and do as you're told. You're going to have to learn not to question all orders."

{That's a logical come back. 'Shut up and do it because I said so'.} Tom thought exasperatedly to herself. After a short second, she said, "How'd you know I yelled at Ezeko? Weren't you and the rest still at the training yard?"

Fianola stopped dead in her tracks, only two hallways away from Tom's room. She turned and gave Tom a sharp look. "You *what*?"

"Or sorry, I thought you knew. I thought that's what all that 'don't question the orders' thing came from. Thought you were trying to lecture me."

"You did *what*?" She persisted, completely flouting Tom previous comment.

"He hurt my horse!"

"Did you actually *yell* at him, or is that just a figure of speech meaning you were talking back."

"No, I actually yelled."

Fi silently turned and continued their journey, staying silent. When they reached the room, Tom opened it and walked in-side, gesturing for Fi to follow while she said, "Come on in, don't just stand there." Then she continued their previous conversation, bored of the quiet. "He deserved it you know."

"That doesn't matter." Fi answered.

"He's a jerk."

"Your opinion of him doesn't matter"

"He was over reacting."

"That-"

"Stop saying that!" Tom interrupted, knowing full well what Fi was going to say. "It *does* matter! I don't like illogical things! He needs to know he's wrong if he's going to be good at his job!"

"Maybe, but it's not your place to teach him. I promise you that whatever you said hasn't gotten to him; he'd never let a page get to him! All that went on today did nothing to him and only landed you in trouble."

"That's not true! I don't *care* what happens to me! Maybe he won't notice me, but some one else will! And they'll agree. And they'll tell some one who will tell some one who *will* be able to get to him, and then something will happen!"

"Who, Tom? Who? Who's this wonderful person who's able to do all these things? Is it-"

"Fine!" tom interrupted again, wondering how they had gotten into this fight. They just met! "Maybe there *is* no one person. We'll do it the old fashioned way, they way that conquers tyrannies. Just unite together as one and fight for what we believe in!"

"Fine Tom, you do that. Get an army together and take Ezeko down." Fi said sarcastically, then stood up from her sitting position on the bed. Tom hadn't thought Fi the sarcastic type.

"Don't talk to me like I'm an ignorant little girl! I'm not out to get Ezeko! So what if he lost his temper? People have a tendency to do that, from time to time! I know I do, if you haven't noticed! He's forgiven for being human!"

"Then what are you making such a big deal out of?" Fi demanded.

"My right to voice my opinion! I believe in the right to free speech, even if it's only a written right in my other home, in America, and not here. I still believe in what's right and the power of people! I'm not you! I won't be oppressed, I won't conform, I won't be silenced. I won't cut off my thumb just 'cause I'm told to! I'll ask, I'll research, I'll think for myself and moralize, then, if I believe in the cause, if I have a d@mn good reason, I'll do it!" Inwardly, Tom was frowning though. Not because she was upset, but because she had come down with a case of lethologica. The words she wanted to use were on the tip of her tongue, and when she substituted them for different words, she sound like she was quoting a speech or the Declaration or something.

Fi got up from the bed and walked out the door. After seeing withheld tears in Fi's eyes, Tom though, {Aw, crap. She's crying. Now what?} Tom wondered if she should follow. She still needed to know where the baths were, too... Tom walked to the door and peeked around the doorframe to down the hall. Fi was at the near the end of the hall and walking fast. She quickly turned the corner and vanished out of sight, not waiting for Tom to catch up. By the sounds of foot steps Tom judged that Fi hadn't stopped just out of sight to give Tom a chance to catch up with her either.

Top sighed as she lay on her bed. She stared at the ceiling with a few small tears of frustration in her eyes. After a few moments of self- pity, she sat up and took the hair clip out of her hair with another sigh. She had the dull pain of a head ache from her yelling, and a sharp pain in the back of her head where her hair clip dung into her skull.

She freshened up, used her magic to make her clean since she wasn't going to be taking any baths today, and went to a list she had hanging from her wall with tape. On the bottom of the long list entitled ~Things to Bring With Me From Home~ she added deodorant. She regretted not wearing any today, and planned to correct the mistake in the future. Then she went to read her book, trying not to doze off. She felt like she was at her summer camp during rest hour. After an early morning filled with activities, she had an hour to herself. Then she heard her stomach grumble. {Except at camp, rest hour comes *after* lunch.}

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Fi went at a near run walk. Once she was out of the halls and in the sunshine, though, she felt better. She took a few deep breaths, then started walking slowly to the women's baths.

Why do some people have to be like that? Tom was a weak little gossiping court lady, and she was just trying to hide the fact behind insults and acting out against her superiors. The girl needed to get off her pedestal. But Fi wouldn't let Tom get to her.

Except Tom *did* get to her, and she didn't know why. It was just as if Tom was calling her a coward...

Well, why should she care if Tom thought she was a coward, anyway? The girl couldn't tell a dagger from a broad sword. Fi had been in several dangerous situations already, and she acted with honor and courage. That little worm didn't know anything about her.

Though these were the thoughts that filled Fi's head, on a subconscious level she really *did* wonder if she was a coward. A knight's ledge of chivalry was about standing up for what is right. Would she ever sacrifice herself to make a point?

All thoughts of self doubt fled from her, though, once she arrived at the bath house, at last. As she entered, a bubble smelling of perfume and feeling of the heat of the heavy steam permeated into her self, into her pores. The women in the main bath all looked up at her and welcomed her with smiles and greetings. Fi smiled. These women were her friends. Everyday she looked forward to coming here, talking and smiling and laughing and joking with her companions. *This* was why she bathed here and not in her own room. *This* is what she wanted to show Tomora. Now she was *glad* they had fought. Their fight prevented her from having to be the one to expose her good friends to Tom. That would have been a blaspheming of her friendships that could never be undone.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Tom walked down a hall, hoping that this was the way to lunch. She had waited in her room as long as she dared, to give Fi a chance to do her duty and sponsor Tom, but it was in vain. Now Tom was trying to find the mess hall. She was *pretty* sure that this was the way, but she was probably wrong.

Why did Fi have to be like that anyway? When Tom had first meet Fi, she got the impression that she was very mature. Apparently she was wrong. She usually was. Why did Fi make a big deal out of it anyway? Tom was mad at Ezeko, not Fi! Tom sighed, then held her breath as she rounded the corner, hoping that it was the right one. There, she saw the double doors leading into the would be knights' mess hall. She had remembered the way.

Opened the door and walked in, feeling a little strange when several sets of eyes looked up. She went to the serving counter and accepted a tray from the cooking maids.

She turned around and surveyed her choices of a seat. The side of the room farthest from her, to the right of the door, was the tables that she expected were dedicated to squires, though she didn't see any there. A short distance any, in the back of the room, was a dais. On the dais was two tables, at which a few middle and elderly aged men were seated. That was the teachers table. There for she was allowed to sit at the tables nearest to her; the pages' table.

Not many people were here, so she must be early. Maybe that had been the half hour bell, not the lunch bell she'd heard. So at least she had her pick of seats. Now, where did she want to sit. By the end. She always liked to sit at the end of the table, farthest from the doors. She walked the few feet to the table and sat accordingly, choosing to sit on the right side, because it was the most out-of-the-way seat. Then she changed her mind and moved her chair to the foot of the table, where no one every sat, and sat on it backwards. Tom always like the head or the foot of a table, and at least this way she was certain that she hadn't taken anyone else's unofficial spot.

She stared down at her food. Bread roll. Slice of something covered in gravy. Some dry looking peas, and a small slice of cake which she could only assume was a treat for them. The bread roll looked soft and was glazed with melted butter. She lowered her face to the tray and tried to smell the thing covered in gravy. She still couldn't tell what it was. Using her fork, she scraped the gravy off part of it. It looked a lot like ham. Smelling it, she decided it was ham. Really old ham... Or something... She stabbed a pea with the fork, and determined that they were indeed very dry. The cake looked like it was supposed to be a white cake, but it had a slight tanish coloring. It also looked pretty grainy, and was void of frosting of any kind.

Even though the food wasn't all very appetizing, she was quite hungry. She knew she wasn't allowed to eat yet though. She had to wait until everyone else was here, and probably until after haMinch said a prayer, too.

She stared blankly at a point across the hall.

She took a small sip of her water.

She drummed her fingers against the table.

......

{Next time I'm bringing a book} Tom thought as she sighed and lowered her head onto the hand of her right arm who's elbow was on the table.

By the time some other boys came into the hall, Tom had formed a small translucent screen out of her magic and was doodling on it with a magic-crafted pen as it floated in front of her face.

Before the two boys who just entered sat at their seats with their trays of food, but after Tom had moved the screen from in front of her face to in the nook of her left arm, laying across her forearm with the bottom resting against the table, top in the air, a group of four boys entered, laughing and talking loudly. Tomora didn't look up at the noise. It wasn't as if she needed to see who was there. She knew that they were her fellow pages and she'd see them plenty over the years. Plus, she always acted un-enthusiastic about everything, even if she *was* interested in it. She never knew why, but she always felt she had to.

Following on the heels of that group was another one, then another (which consisted of Celdric and his cronies) and one more, which included Fi. One by one, the groups made their own way to the serving area, ignoring anyone they weren't talking to, including the women serving them. Out of the whole lot of them, she only heard six people say thank you to the kitchen hands. One each of these 'thank you's belonged to Ashlin and Dustyn, and another to some one who was talking with them.

She watched without actually looking at Dustyn's group as the stopped to look for a place to sit. She saw Dustyn's eyes recognize her, then search around, trying to find some thing. He found it. It was Fi, who was sitting on the opposite side of the table. Then he flickered his gaze back to Tom. She saw him nudge Ash with his elbow and catch his other friend's eyes, then saw his lips move as he told them something. Unsurprisingly, after they nodded, they started walking towards her seat and the seats surrounding her.

As they neared her, Tom put and accenting stroke on the tip of the dragon's wing, then looked up to acknowledge them when they were just a foot or two away. "Hey."

Ashlin responded with, "Hey."

Dustyn said "Hi."

And the new kid said, "hello" with a very slight bow. Tomora returned with a small head bob.

"May we sit here?" Dustyn asked.

Tom knew that he wanted to know why she wasn't sitting with Fi, and knew that sooner or later he'd awkwardly find a subtle way to ask. Tom saved him the effort by saying, "I won't stop you. I'd enjoy the company. I've been sitting here for a half hour with no one to talk to. I got confused on those stupid confusing bells and left my room at the half hour bell instead on the hour bell, I think. Fi wasn't there to show me or tell me because we had a... Slight misunderstanding."

There was vague sense of relief and surprise in Dustyn's face as he moved to sit on her left, though he pretty much kept his cool. She also saw Ashlin smile with good humor as he sat on her right. She suspected that he also knew that what Dustyn would have asked, and knew that she'd said what she'd said on purpose. She didn't know what the third boy's face said; she couldn't see him as he sat the Dustyn's left.

Even though she heard Dustyn take in another breath to say something else, Tom leaned over the table and held out her hand to the other male who she yet knew. As he shook it, she said. "Hi, I'm Someone from Places. Call me Kenret. How are you?"

The boy, who she suspected was slightly shy around strangers, smiled warmly. "Hi, Kenret of places. I'm Airek of Eurot."

Tom nodded and sat back in her chair. "Hi Eric. I promise I'll forget your name by tonight."

"What?" Airek asked, thoroughly confused.

"I'm really bad at names. I'll figure it out eventually, though, when I hear everybody else use your name."

"You could just ask."

"Naw. That'd seemed rude. I'd prefer to do it the hard way."

"Oh come on, you can't be that bad. You still know my name, right?" Dustyn asked.

Tomora stared at him. She closed her eyes tight, opened them wide, closed them again, then opened them normally, all very quickly. She usually did this when she was asked something she *should* know the answer too. Then she pressed her lips together. "Darn it. I made a mental note to remember it... Um, it starts with a t- D! Is starts with D. I think. Not T... Two syllables. Uh...... Davi- no Dustyn! Right?" She asked, speaking very slowly as she was thinking.

"Yeah." The person in quarry answered.

"Yeah!" Tom said in celebration.

"What about me?" Ashlin asked.

"I remember you. You're Ashley. No! You're not Ashley, But you are Ash. I think. And your name is a girl name where I come from... Um, Ashlin? Maybe? Yeah." She guessed, this time more sure of herself and speaking at her normal rate.

"Ashlin. Yeah."

"Hey, why do you remember his name and not mine?" Dustyn asked with false defensiveness.

"Because I fell asleep during Kids WB when Poke' Mon went to commercial and a commercial for a Movie called Little Nikki came on so I had dream about Ash and Misty, except her name wasn't Misty Waterflowers it was Mysti Kal, you know, like Mystical? and her mom and dad were a angel that used to be human and one of the original eight demons of Hell, I don't actually know if there *are* eight original demons in Hell, but in the story there is. Anyway, it turned into a fanfic in my head that I always write when I'm even remotely bored. It has, like, a hundred different versions, and it has nothing to do with poke'mon, really, though once in awhile I'll through in a Pikachu or a Dragonite for plot convenience. Really, the only thing consistent between all the different Versions is that Ash's name is Ash and he has black hair. Most of the time Mysti is Mysti, but not always, and sometimes her parents are like I told you, but not always. Almost always her hair is red, not orange like in the show, and almost always she's immortal and has been around for a long long time. Sometimes Ash is immortal, and sometimes he just lives a lot longer than most humans. In these cases it's because his dad is an Atlantian, from Atlantis. Some times his dad's even the Atlantian King. Anyway, the different stories are pretty good, mostly adventure and love and heartbreak. Lots of heartbreak. Perfect lives are boring to right about. Besides, I always get into character of my characters, and if they cry, I usually do to, and cry tires you out so you can sleep better, and I do most of this writing right while I can't sleep and I'm just lying in bed with my eyes open. Or I do it while I'm asleep being I fell asleep thinking about it."

For a moment she just sat there, everyone's eyes on her. "Anyway, that's mostly why I got confused. I can remember the name Ash because I say it in my head all the time, but Ash has black hair, so for a while I thought Dustyn was Ash, because Dustyn has black hair and you don't." she 'explained', pointing at them at various points in her talking, until her arms nearly got tangled.

More staring. "So, anyway, can I call you Ash?"

Ashlin said yes and Airek said," That was the point of your story? Asking if you could call him Ash?"

"Point? Sure, why not."

Airek and Dustyn sighed.

After a pause, Tom asked, "What were we talking about?"

Everyone shrugged. Then Ashlin asked, "What were you misunderstanding each other about?"

"Ah, well... Fine, it wasn't a misunderstanding, it was a fight. Or really, just an argument."

"About....?" He pressed.

"About logic. And rights. I prefer efficiency, obviously she doesn't. I also like to be my own person, and she thinks I should just be a nameless faceless drone, like a Borg or one of those little army guys from Command and Conquer or Red Alert. It was irritating. She got over emotional and stormed out."

They all looked at her with out really seeing her for a moment as the gears in their heads frantically searched for the meaning of the strange, unrecognized words she'd spoken. None of them wanted to admit they didn't understand what Borg or Poke'mon or any of that was.

Ashlin was the first to speak. "Allll-righty then. U-"

Tom never found out what he was about to say, because just then the double door opened Padraig finally showed up, looking a bit worse for wear. She heard many of the pages make small comments and relieved sighs, though none of them were loud. The pages were too cautious to be loud. If they were loud, Padraig might actually hear, and that wouldn't be good. Tomora didn't say anything, because she hadn't realized that it was him that they were waiting on.

Padraig walked across the hall to the teacher's alter/dias/stage thingy. Tom wondered if she should they should all be standing up, but no one else did, so she didn't. Standing was probably reserved for the king. As Padraig took step onto the dias, Tom looked around the room to discover that everybody else was either watching Lord Padraig, or looking around the room to see what everyone else was doing. She caught the eyes of one of the boys doing this, and he blushed and turned to face Padraig. She also looked back you haMinch, feeling a little silly herself.

Once on his platform, Padraig turned it into a soapbox. "Welcome pages. I hope your first combat classes of the year were a mostly positive experience. I would like to talk more to you about how important it is for you to remain avid in your studies, but I've been informed that I'm late and you are all hungry, so let's skip to the prayer."

There was a collective movement in the room as every single other person, including the rookie pages and the other members on the dias, bowed their head and clasped their hands in prayer, except Tom. She quickly followed suit, just a second behind the rest. She didn't know whether or not everyone else closed their eyes, but she didn't. She was more comfortable with them open, staring down at her hands and the table.

"May Methros protect us during this difficult period. May He grant us the strength to unite as one and to adjust to these new circumstances and changing times, to remain open-minded to new ideas and embrace change. Thank Methros, so mote it be."

"Thank Methros, so mote it be." All but one page answered in monotone.

The one page said, "Amen- uh, so, so moteitbe, Methros, ah, thank... Methros." she sighed. "Yeah, whatever Dude, I'll thank you tomorrow. Or tonight at dinner. What makes so special anyway? What've you done for me, lately, huh? Huh??" She shook her fist in pretend anger at the ceiling.

As to be expected, Airek, Ash and Dustyn all stared at her again. While Airek and Dustyn seemed confused and a tiny bit shocked by the blaspheme, Ashlin was smiling with his good humor at the way she was making a fool of herself, and with a bit of curiosity.

Tom choose to ignore the other two, and answer Ash's unspoken question. "Where I come from, at the end of a prayer, we say Amen, not so mote."

He nodded and Tom smiled. She didn't smile because of him, she smiled because she had just now realized the connection between her and the prayer; she hadn't really been paying attention before. She remembered how Kel had been insulted by Wyldon through the prayers. She had just been accepted by haMinch through the prayer. She smiled broadened, then died quickly like it always did. Not because it was killed by an unpleasant thought, but she didn't smile often, and when she did, they had short life spans.

Tom started to wave her hand to destroy her magic art piece, but Ashlin's hand on her forearm stopped her. "Don't" He said. "That's really good. Did you draw it?"

Tom favored him with a small smile. She liked it when she got complements from boys. Not just because they were *boys*, but because way back in the wee little elementary school grades, even back into kindergarten, when all the boys were still in their 'girl's are icky' stage, their accolade had to be true, because boys didn't usually say nice things to girls. They went against the boundaries of gender to pay her a compliment, so she must be deserving of it. This feeling had stayed with her as she got older. A guy, especially one her age, no matter what that age might be, in her mind had better taste in art, this was almost always false, most guys couldn't tell abstract from a photography, but they still held their own clout.

"Yeah, I did, thanks. But I can't keep it, it's a magic canvas. It has to go eventually."

"I suppose." He said, taking the illustration of a dragon from her hands. "But you can at least wait until I'm not watching."

"That's what I say to the little boy I baby-sit. He's a brat, a very, very spoiled brat. He was what has to be a million Legos, and he loves to play with them. He does pretty freakin' good for a four-year-old. He's even won some competitions. But whenever I make one of my really good things that take forever being the perfectionist that I am, and he always wants to destroy them immediately. Now that I think about it, I guess it might be because he doesn't like other people to do better than him, but I always assumed that it was because he's a little monster. Anyway, I always tell him he can do whatever he wants to it after I leave. And I can here it crash before I'm all the way out of the door." She rolled her eyes.

He nodded like he understood, but he still seemed distracted by the picture. Why was he staring at it so much? It was a *doodle*! It wasn't exactly a de Vinci! She was strangely relieved when she realized it wasn't the art but what the picture was of, when he asked, "Don't take this the wrong way, but it's, it's awfully fake looking. I mean, it looks like a living creature, with the way you can see the muscles bunch under the scales and the way the bones are shaped, but it doesn't look like a *dragon*. Oh wait, is this the way dragons look where you come from?"

"Nah. We don't have dragons where I come from."

"You mean they're still in the divine realms, there?"

"Nope. We don't have any divine realms, we don't have any dragons, and we don't have any magic. We be a boring peoples, that's why I prefer to hang out here."

Ash did *not* seem to agree with her being boring. " If you have no dragon, how is it you can draw something almost similar, and know to call it a dragon?"

"Well, immortals take shape in dreams, right? If some one from this world can think of a dragon, why can't some one from mine. Dragons are fictional. The basic laws are dragons look cool, and are fire breathing lizards. Even those rules aren't concrete. Dragons look like whatever your imagination wants them too. I draw dragons in many many different ways, this just being today's style."

He nodded and their conversation ended to allow consumption of food.

The rest of lunch went by depressingly fast. She and Ash talked about T.V., well, actually, she explained the concept of television, the news, sitcoms, reality shows, commercials and the like, while he listened. Dustyn and Airek talked about their summer vacations spent at their home fiefs. Tomora didn't eat her peas. She only like sweet peas, and even those she wouldn't eat this dry. She ate half of her ham, after scraping off the disgusting gravy. Even then, she had to force herself to eat the part she did, because that 'ham' smelled like sandwich meat that had been left on the counter over night, and was just about nothing but fat. {I thought the Palace was supposed to have the best food in the country...} She didn't like the white cake either, though she suspected it *was* the best in the country, it was just the medieval style that she didn't like. She traded it for one of her new friends rolls(she like the rolls a lot). The other of her friends just gave her their rolls for free because they didn't like them. {Does *everyone* here have bad taste?}

Near the end of the lunch, they returned their trays to the scullery maids, and talked until the bell rang, then she followed on their heels to their next class.

"What *is* our next class?" Tom asked, happy that it wasn't like the schools in the real world where everyone had different classes. Here, she could just follow the rest of the herd to the next pasture.

"Reading and writing." Ashlin answered, and then laughed as Airek shuddered.

"Not you favorite class, huh?" Tom asked Airek.

"No." was his flat answer.

The room was decently sized, well lit by windows and candles in front o mirrors. Tom thought that a single standard light bulb would so an even *better* job, but that couldn't be helped. As she started to walk in and saw all the seats, she leaned over to the one closest to her, Airek, and asked, "Is there arranged seating?" in a not-quite-a-whisper.

Airek shook his head.

Tom walked in feeling like she forgot something, like a back pack, but every one else came in empty-handed, too, so she figured she was okay. She had no idea where to sit an felt like every one was watching her, but when her new gang all sat down on the back right corner, close to the door, Ashlin gestured for her to sit in a seat next to them, and she did.

The teacher turned out to be some monk guy. A Mithran Priest, actually, one of the ones that shaves his head and wears orange robes. Tom had seen plenty of them at the academy of magic. They all had the same drab monotone voice that made you want to fall asleep, especially after all that weapons training. He assigned whatever the standard writing assignments were to three fourths of the class, then tested the other fourth, the brand new pages, on reading and writing.

Everybody could read, some better than others. One lad had lots of trouble and was immediately assigned lots of roomwork (homework). She felt sorry for him. She was an excellent reader, being the bookworm that she was. Most of them could read for content, could understand what they were reading, could gather a main idea. All of them could write their letters, except that one kid, Hreny she thought she heard him be called, that could barely read, could also barely write.

Out of all of them, though, she was the only one who knew what a noun was. Knew what a verb, an adverb, an adjective and all that was. She knew the components of a sentence, what an incomplete sentence was, what a compound sentence was, what a compound word was, and where to break a paragraph. She knew *all* the proper use of commas, colons, parentheses, apostrophes and sentence ending punctuation. She wasn't so sure about semi- colons, but luckily, he didn't ask.

Through the ninety minutes of class time she took test, recited and answered. The poor priest didn't know what to do with her. In the end, he assigned her a writing piece to do in her 'free time' so she could prove she could use what she knew in her writing. She had a week to do it. What she was going to do during the actual class, no one knew didn't know.

When the class bell rang, everyone got up and headed out the door, Tom a moment behind everyone else.

"Are you okay?" Ash asked her in the hall as she blindly followed the other trout down the stream. "He seemed to be really coming down on you, more than the new boys. He never seemed to have a problem with Fi-"

"Oh, he wasn't being hard, he was just testing me exactly like the others. Every time you pass a test, you need to take another one, so he knows what you know."

Ash's eyebrows went up. "I take it you've already taken a writing class?"

"Well yeah, a fourth grader would know all that. Or a least I've known all that since fourth grade."

"What's a fourth grader?"

"Oh! Um, in my world just about everybody goes to school. Except people who can't afford it or are unschooled like me. Um, when you're like, three or four you go to preschool, which I never went to actually. At five is kindergarten, which I hated. The first grade up to, ummmmm, twelfth or so. Then you could go to college, and all those degrees and things. Fourth graders are about, um, nine years olds, I guess."

More arched eyebrows. "You country's real into education, isn't it?"

"Yeah, we tend to pride ourselves on it. Except New Mexico. New Mexico schools are very poor quality, they totally bite. Nothin' but crap."

She got the feeling that Ash wanted to know more about the way their school run, he seemed to be infinitely curious about every aspect of her world, but they seemed to be at the next class room.

Everybody piled in, all but some who'd gone to a privy. The teacher wasn't there yet and everybody who was their were chatting, so she guessed they had a sort of passing period. A little while after the rest dwindled in, the teacher showed up, but didn't do anything until after another small bell rang. That confirmed the passing period theory.

The teacher was another priest dude, this one seemed to be a brunette, though it was hard to tell with the shaved head, chin and eyebrows. Also, this time he passed out miniature chalkboards, slates, and small, *primitive* chalk type things, unlike the last one who passed out some old quills and parchment.

The priest, whose name she couldn't pronounce, welcome them to the math class. He handed out review-ish thingys for the old students to make sure they didn't forget too much over the break. Then proceeded to test the new guys by writing problems on their slates for them to work out. Tom remembered that Alanna hadn't even finish all four of her roomwork problems. This was doing to be easy. Besides, math was her favorite subject.

Now, with that cocky attitude, you'd think something unexpectedly bad would happen, but no.

As the priest was still writing down the problem, she answered it verbally, but quietly, because everyone else in the room was absolutely silent. He frowned, then started to write another, which she answered while he was writing the equal sign. After many of these he gave the 'geometry is in everything' speech. It took all of will not to tell the stuck up, full of himself bald guy to shut up and get on with it, that she'd heard it all before. Unfortunately, all her will wasn't good enough.

She did, however, manage to say it a wee bit nicer than she was thinking about it. She even said it in a way that would make it over reacting if he punished her for it. With his nose in the air like a teenage girl, he wrote what he no doubtedly thought was an impossible problem that took up most of her board. She answered it in just over two seconds. She was lucky, though, a problem like that usually took her a minute or two, but this one was freakishly similar to the one she'd done in yesterday in her room to kill time that she was stuck on for a good fifteen minutes.

Eyebrow raised in a way that said he wouldn't be defeated, the orange clad man gestured for her to follow him to the front of the room. This attracted a lot of attention in the still room. Up front, where the board was bigger, he wrote a series of problems that she started to work on as soon as he finished the first one. She finished answering them about forty seconds after he had finished righting them. Though she didn't look anywhere but the board, she could feel herself being watched.

Then he quiz her verbally. She didn't have to answer what a variable or anything like that was, because she'd already shown she knew how to work with them. Instead, he'd ask for a formula for something, or he'd give her the formula, and she'd tell him what it could be used for. After awhile, she gave in to temptation again.

"You know what? Why don't we save ourselves some time and do it the easy way?" She asked rhetorically, her voice ringing clear in the hushed room. "I'll tell you what the last things I've learned are, and you can tell me whether or not you've ever even heard of the, okay?"

"Watch your tone, *page* Tomora." He said dangerously.

Even while wondering whether the normally monotone priests were *allowed* to use that tone of voice, Tom replied with a small, but not too small, bow, "Yes master mathematician." to hide the fact she didn't know his name or if she could call him 'sir'. " I apologize if I seem condescending or patronizing. I meant no insult. I was merely suggesting a more efficient way of order. If my voice gave away hint of different intentions, it was not meant to. I fear I may be a little tense due to my headache." She said in a extremely respectful, un-patronizing tone that shocked Ash and Airek, and relieved Dustyn.

Something about Tom's voice and the way she said it more than her actual words made the mathematicians face soften visibly. "It's alright. That's probably best. Go ahead." As he handed Tom the chalk, not a face in the room was free of surprise.

{Apparently he doesn't act nice often} Tom thought as she started erasing the board. "Let's start with algebra." She told her 'teacher'. Then she wrote out three of the last things she learned in her algebra studies. She made the equations difficult, but whenever she knew she was going to have to multiply something, she'd use the numbers she had memorized, zeros, ones, twos, fives, nines, and tens. Multiplication wasn't exactly her kick; it required more memorizing.

"Recognize any of these formulas or theories?" She ask him, quietly. He'd brought her up to the front of the class for two reasons, the smaller of which was the larger board. The main reason was because he wanted to humiliate her. She, however, decided it was best to not embarrass him in front of his class; it would not help his short fuse grow. Obediently, the class took the hint that this was a private conversation and went back to their own work."

He pointed to one, and said "Simultaneous equations." then he shook his head. "But I don't recognize those other two."

"Alright, then lets try geometry." She erase the boards once more and wrote more problems, this time it took longer because she had to draw figures and diagrams and graphs. When she finished, she looked at the balding shaven headed guy to see if he knew any of this. All the faces that had started to watch her again returned to their assignments. She figured her the mathematician could out do her, or at least be as good as her in geometry. Weren't the medieval people the ones who had all that geometry stuff figured out? Or was that the Romans? If the Romans had it, shouldn't these people too, since they came after? They did come after, right? Gah... History = bad.

"I know the other two," the man said, "but I don't even understand what's going on in this one." he said, pointing to the last.

"Really?" Tom said while thinking {'what's going on in this one'? Isn't that, like, too modern for him to be saying?} "I thought you would. It's that, uh, whatch-you-ma-call-it theorem. Ack, can't remember the guys name. But I guess it wouldn't really wouldn't matter anyway, 'cause it would probably be a different guys name here. It's like the poly.... Ya, never mind, I can't think of the name. See, you can use it to build bridges and stuff, which is why I thought you'd know it. Um, see, it's, if you know the length of two side, you can figure out the other one. Same with the angles. There's a lot of it." She wiped part of the board and used he empty space to write more of it. "There's all this Side-Angle-Side crap, the 30o-60o-90o rule, all the tangents and sines and cosines..." She looked back up at him. He was baffled. Fascinated, but baffled.

Then she erased the board and started simpler geometry. Formulas and diagrams showing how to find area and surface area, volume and perimeter of normal shapes, like squares and triangle, of proper shapes, like cubes, cones, and pyramids, and strange looking polygons went up. She looked back to the teacher, just to see more amazement in his eyes.

"Some of this is our most recent great discoveries. More of it, we haven't discovered yet." Though he spoke to her, his gaze never left the board as he tried to memorize all of it at once. Math was his life, after all.

{Dork...}

She purposely put her back between him and her board, then started erasing quickly. First she just went choppily over it, so the problems no longer made sense since they were missing a few spots, then went over more thoroughly, erasing every bit of chalk there. She didn't want to give these people too any new technology.

"I guess that means I don't need go into trig, then? Well, actually, the what'su-ma-call-it theorem was kinda trig-ish, but I mostly consider it geometry..."

"No, no I don't think you need to go further." He said, still mourning the lose of such amazing new information. "That's quite enough. You may leave early today and we will talk about what to do with your time you would normally spend in class later tonight. Thank you, Page Tomora, you may go."

Tom was a deer in the headlights. "Um, okay, thanks." She put the chalk down, then glanced around to make sure she wasn't forgetting anything. Then she quietly walked out, feeling strange the way everyone was watching her.

She didn't know what to do or where to go, but she started down the hall anyway. She didn't want everyone in that room to think she was just waiting outside the room for the bell to ring, even if that was what she was doing. She stopped about halfway down the hall, still with-in plain sight of the class room door, and sat down in a window sill. It was one of those tiny window, the kind that archers can shoot out of but people have troubles shooting into and people can't use to climb into, but the wall was thick, and the sill went from wider in the front to the narrow in the back, so that it was wide enough for an archer to rest his bow, or for a teen-aged girl to sit on for a little while, though it was uncomfortable and she could only rest half herself on it.

{I wonder how long 'til class ends. I need to be here when it ends so those guys can show me where the next one is.

{Do it have time to go get my book?

{Should I have done that? Didn't Kel's brother what's-his-face tell her not to stand out? Would it be better for me not to stand out?

{Well I guess it doesn't really matter. I always stand out, and I like it. Even if I was like them in class, I still wouldn't be like them the rest of the time. Who cares what they think?

{.....

{I'm definitely bringing a book with me everywhere I go, tomorrow.}

She settled in and close her eyes, brain storming for the next chapter of her Harry Potter fanfic. It was hard to write Tomora Pierce fics now that she'd seen part of them. It was easier to describe the land and culture and everything else, but it was hard to make it exciting. Corus was just as boring as the real world, once you got down to it. Everyone went by with their daily lives, the only exciting things are visits from old friends and holidays. And magic got boring after awhile.

Turned out that class had only been about five minutes away from being over. As she heard the door open, she picked herself up and headed towards it. Where she was might be the way they were going anyway, but it might not and she'd fall behind.

Turn out she was down the right hall, because everyone started headed toward her, talking loudly with freedom from the silent room. When she got close to her new friends, she stopped and turned around, then walked forward as they cam equal to her sides.

Ash, always full of questions and quick to the point, asked immediately, "How did you do that? He's *never* been that nice!"

"Magic."

Airek stopped dead in his tracks, then quickly started forward again, to not draw attention. Ask and Dustyn were wide-eyed as they came in close to her.

"You can't do that!" Dustyn said in a harsh whisper, making Tom's eyes go wide as well.

"It's illegal to force magic upon some one!" Ash said, equally quiet and equally fierce. "Do you have any idea how much trouble you could get in? I-"

"Woah, woah, okay, jeez, calm down there. I didn't use magic." Tom said, not following the quiet trend.

"What?"

"I didn't use magic."

"But you just said-" Ash started.

"I didn't mean it seriously. In my world we have no magic. When I say something's magic, it either means I don't know, I don't feel like explaining it because it's complicated, or I just say it because I always say it."

There was a brief pause as Ash deciphered her meaning, then he said, "So you didn't use magic on him?"

"No."

"Then what did you do?"

"I'm an actress. I just acted like a was a sweet little girl whose all confused and lost. It worked, so I'm assuming he has a daughter or a grand daughter. Or maybe a niece, is he allowed to have children, being a priest guy and all?"

Sighs of relief, and Ash answered with out answering her question, "I don't know, I don't know much about Mithran priests, and I never felt the urged to ask."

"Sounds reasonable. So, anyway, what's next? If we're going for all the basic courses, we're missing history, geography, and science. I'm assuming we aren't going to get any electives, either... What about an art class?"

"Our next class is history and law with Sir Myles." Dustyn informed her.

"Sir Myles?"

He nodded.

"Wow, really? He's still alive? I figured he be dead by now!" She exclaimed, then felt embarrassed, "I mean, well, it's just that he was ancient when my mom was, like, ten. Oh sumthing. Yeah, ten. I'm so glad I get to meet him."

Before anyone had the chance to say something to make her feel less stupid, they were filing into Sir Myles class room with the rest of them. As she expected, everyone was quiet, but not for fear of getting punish like in math. They all seemed eager to start, especially after spending three months out of class. Probably, while this class stayed their favorite, as time went by they'd became less eager.

When Tom walked in, she saw a old short man at the front of the class. He was about the same height as her, five-foot-four, and had a major beer belly. Most of his, uh, *plump*ness, was hidden under a mass of curly white hairs that were his beard and hair. His hair was longer than her's, currently, going down almost to his hips.

"Grandpa Miles!" She called out, but not too loud, she'd had enough attention for now.

The elderly knight looked up from some papers at the sound of her.

"Grandpa Miles!" she called again as she got closer. "I'm going to hug you now." She warned him.

"Oof!" He exclaimed as she did so. His hair got in her face and he smelled strange, but she was willing to forgive that. "Your Alanna's, then, are you?"

"Aye. Okay, I'll be a good girl now and go sit down with everybody else." She said. When she looked at the seats, all the ones nearest to the front were taken. Her group was near the front, but there weren't any seats left near them. One of them made a shrugging jester to try to say they tried to save her a seat, but she just shrugged back because it didn't matter. She felt safe enough in this class to sit by herself.

She sat towards the back, even though there were closer spaces available. She didn't like feeling crowded. She was content to sit perfectly still with her eyes closed and listen to him drone on. Unfortunately, after mere moment she realized that that was a bad idea. She didn't like going to bed early, so she'd gone to bed far too late for someone getting up before dawn. Then she'd done the exercising. Sitting still and comfortable and with her eyes closed would make her fall asleep. Besides, Myles needed to 'test her knowledge'.

He passed out some sort of paper with a passage from some book to the ones who weren't to be tested, and talked to the others one by one. It turned out the almost all noble sons had major tutoring in history and law. The each said they were a certain level number of 'berks'. Apparently, a berk was like a grade level. Most said they learned five berks, some more, some less.

As she heard the boy next to her loudly answer Mile's question with a, "Nine berks, sir" Her eyes shot open and she realized she'd been nodding off.

As Miles turned to her, he asked, "How about you, lass? How many berks have you earned yourself?"

"Uh, none, sir. I'm not from around he remember? Um, I know about the Immortals war, I know why Bazhir never considered themselves part of the country until recently and what happened to change their minds. I know a little about Bazhir culture, little about 'my' own culture. I know almost nothing about Bazhir laws and I know that Tortallian laws are completely bogus, sexist, racist, and say that some people are worth less than others because they have less money. I.E.- Nobles versus Peasants. I... I don't think I know anything else, really, sir."

"Well, that's what you here for, isn't it? It'll just take a bit more work on both our parts."

"Yes sir."

"You may start with this." He added after he'd walked to the nearest bookshelf and back, handing her not only the paper and passage that everyone else got, but a very heavy book. Or tomb. Or volume or novel or some other literature piece.

"Oh joy. Thank you, sir, for this won-der-ful opp-or-tun-i- ty. I am sim-ply en-thralled." She responded in complete emotionless monotone, on syllable at a time.

He laughed. "I bet. Read that one now and the first chapter of that in you free time." he directed, gesturing to the passage and tomb, respectively. Then he went to the next student.

{Free time?} she thought, {I distinctly remember the other knights not having that...} It only took here a few long minutes to read the passage. When she was done, she did nothing for a while, just waiting for some one to tell her to do something, like to answer questions about the boring passage about the history of law. From the history and law class. Very original. Then she remembered that she was fully capable of reading from the tome while waiting.

After several pages, she broke out of the trance like thing she had always went into when reading for more then five minutes, and wondered just how long it would be until she was to discuss the passage she just read. She stared into space, then went back to reading. The next time she stopped, she had finished the chapter, and had made her way through one and a half more, with out realizing she could stop already. She looked up and around, and just as she was wondering if people raised their hands to ask questions here in Tortall as well, the bell rang and everyone stood up. Class was over.

She got up and carried her belongings with her, trying to figure out if she was supposed to keep the book with her. She figured she was, so she did, then trotted up to Airek, Ashlin, and Dustyn. "So, what's next?" She asked them, and for a long time they didn't answer, just looked at each other.

"Um.." Airek 'said'.

"Uh...." Ashlin replied.

"Well... It's Master Lindhall's class..."

Ashlin laughed. "Yeah. I can' quite remember what he teaches...

The others laughed. "Neither can I..."

She gave them all a look but shrugged and laughed along. "Aren't you all the avid students?"

( Author's Note: Here, let me explain... You see, it's simple. I read through every Tamora Pierce book, even the ones not related to knight training, *and not ONE of them bothered to say the name of the class!!!!* So, I could've avoiding telling you all, like Tamora decided to, but instead, I did this, so I could prove that I'm not bitter, and never hold a grudge...)

The room was a strange one. One wall held just the door, another a simple window, and the other two were crammed packed with strange things, funky plants growing from rocks, weird things, probably flesh of some sort, suspended in colored water, and mold growing on unidentifiable things. Also, there we many cages, each with an animal of some sort in it. She went to the closest one and looked at it, seeing a large turtle inside.

By the time everyone was seated and Lindhall Reed had called the class to order, she was still watching the turtle, shaking her head like people do when talking in baby talk, saying, "You're ugly! Yeah! Yeah! You're an ugly turtle, yes you are, yes you are!" Reed cleared his throat loudly, and she rushed to a seat , sitting down hard, before even looking at the person clearing their throat.

Luckily, the teacher only smiled good humoredly. "Welcome returning members, and a special greeting to the new ones. I'm Lindhall Reed, your master in-"but before he could finish his sentence, what looked like a bunch of flying popsicle sticks fluttered across the room and landed on one of the new page's desk. She was pretty sure it was Gile's. This led to him screaming out in surprise, and the sticks to screeching loudly. As the sticks leapt back up from the desk Master Lindhall said, "Bones!"

At the same moment as Lindhall did, Tomora also called out that name, as she had finally seen that it was not sticks, but a bird made of bones, and recognized it from The Immortals series.

Bone Dancer hesitated in the air for a moment not sure whether to obey his master, or the new one. Knowing that is master's voice held annoyance, and the girl's held amusement, he choose to fly over to Tom.

As Tom lifted her finger to stroke the creature on her desk, Lindhall walked over and frowned at it, and it looked down, properly ashamed, even though it was obvious he wasn't very upset. "You know better than that, Bone Dancer."

Tomora looked from him, then to Bone Dancer. She'd forgotten the bird's name, actually, but she was sure his nick name had something to do with Bones, because people aren't always very creative. She gave a little laugh, and Master Reed sighed. "Apologize to the boy, Bones, and go back to your perch." he said sternly.

Bone Dancer flew winglessly to the prior offended page, but instead of going back to his branch, he went to Tomora again. That earned him another look from Lindhall, but when he still didn't fly to his perch, Lindhall sighed and said, " Bone Dancer does seem to prefer females. I'm glad that he doesn't spook you. I'll make him go back to his perch if you wish, but he would like to stay with you, if you allow it."

Bones nodded and looked at her with what could only be a pleading look, even though it looked the same, since he no longer had facial features.

With a smile, she replied, "That's fine with me, sir," and Reed nodded, then went back to the front of the class.

The rest of class was pretty uneventful. She was tested, yet again. Although no one had yet told her the actual intention of what was to be learned in this class, she was reasonably sure it was a science class.

The hour and a half or whatever it was that went by involved many question, all about things that would be found in fourth grade science. Photosynthesis was not needed in this class. So, of course, she passed everything thrown at her, had yet another 'class' that wouldn't actually teach her anything. She did a lot of sighing.

By the end of this class at least three people were looking at her at all times, though she didn't know why. It's not like she had answers written on her, or as if they'd figure out what made her ever-so- fascinating by constantly staring at her. But that's what people did to other people who were deemed weird. They stared.

She trudged out of the class, still being watched as Bone Dancer left her shoulder, even by her little gang. She didn't ask what the next class was right away, for several reasons. First, she didn't want it to seem as if she were avoiding any questions they were planning on asking. She wasn't. Also, part of her didn't want to know. She was too tired to think of another class, though she'd have to when they got there, unfortunately. The other reason was simply that they knew she as going to ask, so why wait until she actually did, and not just tell her straight out?

Walking down the corridor, they exchanged looks, privately deciding which one of them should talk, not because they didn't want to, just because they shouldn't start to talk all at the same time. {These guys are definitely trained for obeying people on the battlefield} she thought as Ash spoke up. "Next is either magic or immortals."

"It's easy to figure out which you're in, normally. If you have the gift, you go to magic, if not, the immortals." Airek informed her.

"You have a gift, right?" Dustyn asked. "Then you're in magic, with me and Ash."

"But-" Ashlin put in, "She's already a fully trained sorceress. Wouldn't it be a waste of time?"

"Yeah, I don't want to be bored out of my mind, learning the same stuff over." Tom said to remind them, well, mostly Ash, that she was still there, and didn't appreciate them talking as if she weren't. She then realized that she knew near nothing about real magic casting, so she wouldn't be bored at all.

"I guess you'll just have to tell the Masters." Airek decided for her, and the others agreed, and that's what she had been planning on, anyway.

She followed Airek to Immortals Class. She entered the chat with all the other pages, several of the youngest of which gasped upon entrance. Tom looked to see what they thought was so amazing, and saw what was indeed an amazing sight. Though she, as a rule, didn't get too excited about it.

She saw a great big lizard, about seven feet tall, standing on his hind legs, his long neck arched. He seemed to be made of a pearl- gray material, like little tiny beads melted together. Highly cool. Like a big art project. He had, well, she assumed it was a he, long slender legs that ended in lengthy digits, each with a silver claw. He looked at the pages with eyes like a cat's, with the slit pupils, and what looked like a smile on his short, lipless muzzle.

Kenret, unfazed but still thinking how highly cool he was, went up to the basilisk she was expecting to see, and said, "Hey, Teacher, can I be right back? I don't know if I'm in this class or the magic class yet, so I should go ask, unless you'd know."

He curved his neck as he looked down at the tactless girl. "You may." He said in a ghostly, whispering voice.

Airek gave her vague directions to the magic classroom, and she went there at a quick trot. Entering, she heard a man stop mid-sentence so look at her. The teacher, obviously. Standing next to him was Master Numair. "Yes?" The apparent teacher inquired.

Tom bowed, not sure if she was doing it right, but it's not hard to bow, after all, and said, "begging your pardon, but I am here to inquire which class I am to be attending at this time. See, in the City of the Gods I already-" She stopped. Numair and the teacher were already talking to each other.

Then Master Numair addressed her. "Are you the full level sorceress, then, lass?" ( Author's Note: Did Numair talk like that, or is my memory betraying me?)

She nodded. First day and already well known. She was certainly making a name for herself, though she wasn't sure what name that was.

Numair ignored her and looked to the instructor. "It makes no sense for her to do that again."

"No, Master Numair."

"You and her would only be wasting your time."

"Yes Master Numair."

After a pause, Numair said, "Well? Send her off!"

"Oh, yes." he turned to Tom. "You may go back to Master Tkaa's class, now, Tom."

She nodded, and said "Alright, thanks" Then rolled her eyes once in the hall way and ran along the halls. She skidded around a corner, and realized either this room was the one or she was lost. She peaked in the door, still panting form being out of breath. It was the class. She opened the door and walk in, all eyes on her. She shrugged off the attention, and sat between Ashlin and Dustyn. They smiled at her, and look back at Tkaa. She folllowed suit.

At last, a class with no testing in it. Apparently, in the immortals class the is a set curriculum that is to be followed for every year. Each of the students would follow that curriculum, even if they already new it, and had done it a hundred times. Exactly like the public schools in her home. The familiarity relieved her a bit, though she was sure why, since she hated public schools and had no problem with the way the others ran their classes.

Tkaa, whose name she had given up on pronouncing, gave them a brief over view of what each of the years would be studying, and told about some 'fun little trips', or field trips, she guessed, that he was thinking about. He then assigned a book to each year, passed them out, and made them start on the first chapter. It really wasn't all that bad. She almost liked it, even, though it wasn't that different from some of the other classes, and she knew she'd quickly hate the work. She did *not* appreciate schedules. Which really made her wonder what kind of mistake she had made coming here...

Following blindly to the nest class, examining her workload, she didn't notice the change in all of the experienced pages. They were quieter, calmer, and all-in-all unhappy about going to their next class, it would seem to some one who was paying attention. They also walked straighter and had much better posture. She, however, was slouched over, scowling at the books she had to carry. One from Myles and one from Tkaa, and she was sure to have more tomorrow. Also, she pledged to be prepared with a reading book tomorrow. And there was no way they could stop her from bringing from mechanical pencils. Those quills were freakin' *evil*. She better get some pens, too, in case her teachers wanted it in ink. So that meant she would have to also get a backpack from home next week, among the other things on her list.

As everyone stopped in front of a door, and walked in single file, even the new pages with instruction from their mentors, she finally thought to ask her companions what class was next. Just before they stepped in, they made a face and said, "Etiquette", then went in promptly, not giving her time to complain. She followed, standing a bit straighter, but mostly because she had finished examining her books, not because she cared what the teacher thought. Everyone seemed to have assigned seating, meaning the new ones all got stuck sitting in the remaining empty places.

As she thumped her books loudly on an empty desk, the unpleasant looking old guy in the front of the room, who she could only presume to teacher, especially since everyone was looking at him with respect. She plopped down in her little wooden seat, examining the room. It was kind of small compared to the other ones and had no window, making it hot and stuffy in there. She smiled.

Small, hot, and stuffy was fine with her. She preferred small spaces to big ones. never seemed to mind when it was stuffy, and she loved being hot. She must have cold blood, because she almost never seemed to be warm.

The teacher seemed almost to growl, catching her attention. She made a wild guess by the loathing way he looked at her that he didn't like her much... "Hello, *pages.*" He said, quite too loud for the silent room, hurting her ears and making plenty of the boys flinch, even the older ones. He seemed to like the reaction. "This *class*, as I'm sure you all *know*, is where you are to be learning, the proper *etiquette*, for a *page*, or for *a knight*. *I*, shall be thee one, who will be *teaching*, you, these *rules* of *so-ci-e-ty*. *You*, are **not** here to play! You will pay *attention* and do *precisely, as *I* say*!" He said.

Tomora couldn't get over how incredibly annoying it was how he emphasized nearly every-other word, and paused after them as well. Maybe someone put the dreaded Curse of Commas on him... He certainly seemed to be suffering from it.... "Yes, sir!" She said, snapping a sloppy salute. She was amazed at how loud her voice carried in the room.

As the teacher glared daggers at her. Everyone else also looked at her as well, astonished. She supposed that maybe she could have *not* done that...

"You! What is your name?" He barked.

"Tomora, sir."

"Again! You did it again! You are just trying to bait me, lass!"

"Wha-"

"*Two* times, you have *called* me *sir*, and *I*, know, *per- fect-ly* well, that *you* know, that **sir**, is the **title**, for a *full knight*,** not**, a **teacher**!"

She jumped. He really was very loud... "N-No, I just- where I come from, sir is a term of respect for all, not knights, we don't even have any knights..." She said. She was barely phased, but she acted as if rightfully intimidated. Couldn't really hurt. But then. after seeing the gloating look on Fi's face, who enjoyed it way too much, she refused to pretend to be scared. Wasn't worth it...

"Do not talk until you are spoken to!" He screamed at her.

She glared at him, disbelieving how stupid he could be. "But you just spoke to me! I was spoken to!"

"Do not talk back, girl!" He said, spittle flying from his mouth, and a lisp forming, though the irritating emphasis on strange words stopped. "You shall not talk to me in that voice! I may have spoken *to* you, but I did not *speak* to you! I did not say anything requiring your response, such as an inquiry!"

"Yes you did! I think I have the right to defend myself, no matter how minor I may be!"

"SILENCE!"

"Oh that was lame. Some back..." She muttered under her breath. Except, in this room, sound definitely carried, and it was perfectly audible.

She flinched, and then he ordered him out of her room. She stormed out, fuming and glaring at nothing in particular, and sat with her back against the wall, not a foot from the door. After a regulated five minutes of pretending to be perfectly pissed for no one's benefit, she stop, sat back, and brainstormed her next chapter for her fan fic, then accidentally fell asleep.

She woke up, though, just as they all filed out the door. She tried to get up, but round up losing her balance, and getting a head rush to boot. She thudded back down, her back and part of her head scrapping against the wall

She heard some one suck in a breath. She looked up, rubbing her head, to see Ash's concerned but smiling face looking down at her. She took the hand he extended to her. "You okay there? That looked painful."

She smiled, and pulled herself up with his hand, putting all her weight on it so he almost fell over as well; most people just tugged a tiny bit for leverage, but not she. He laughed as they both had to grab onto the wall to remain standing, and she claimed while regaining composer, "Of course I'm alright, I do crap like that all the time. It didn't hurt that bad... Besides, I'm not made out of glass.... I'm made of super high intensity plastic! Remember, 'plastics make it possible'!" She said, the last bit a quote from the TV commercials that really weren't much of commercials at all, seeing as how they weren't trying to get you to buy something in particular.

Looking at the puzzled expression on his still smiling face, walking down the hall with him. "It's a TV thing." She explained, having already discussed what television was at lunch. "You know commercials? It's one of those."

She looked at them, and saw relief on there faces. Sometimes blessed with the ability to read people, she knew that they had been afraid she'd still be in a horrid mood, and were surprised to find her smiling. Ash, on her left, nodded in vague understanding, and Dustyn, on Ash's left, shook his head at the two of them. He had listened to most of the midday meal conversation, but still had no idea what they were talking about. I would be easy to believe that they were saying random words just to confused him. Airek, on her right, made no showing that he heard a thing anyone around him was saying, just walked looking straight ahead. He had to hear them, though, he was right by them. "A commercial?" Ash asked, continuing the conversation. "Trying to get you to buy plastics, then?"

She shrugged, smiling a teeny tiny bit at how his thoughts skimmed to almost following her own. "Something like that, yeah." She replied.

They walked in silence for a bit. She held back asking fro a minute, in case he was trying to form another question for her, but then went ahead. " So who's next? Please tell me there's no one worse? 'Such a jerk..."

She sensed everyone within hearing distance looking at her without actually looking at her, watching her out of the corners of her eyes. She widened her eyes is a motion that reminded one as rolling them. Jerk wasn't exactly the most colorful word that would describe some one like that, so why were all like that? Later that night, Ash told her that the teacher was more than a little intimidating. People, despite the fact it was an unreasonable belief, seemed to think that he was everywhere, and could hear anything they said, especially in the hallways going and coming from the class. It sounded like something her mom would say... Non-the- less, at the time, all he said was, "He can over react a bit, but he has very strict rules. You should try and take the time to learn them, so he won't get like that again..."

"Pshh." Was how she replied. " How was I supposed to know my teach was PMSing? " She asked rhetorically.

"What-ing?"

She eyes widened, realizing her mistake. "Nothing, never mind." she said quickly, but it was clear that he wasn't going to take that as an answer. She sighed. "That week before a woman's monthly, where she get over emotional and cranky and all that, is referred to as PMS. I'd tell you what it stands for, but I'd probably say it wrong, and it wouldn't help you anyway..."

For a delay he just widen his eyes and blushed, looking straight ahead, but then him, Dustyn, and Ariek all broke out laughing, which made her chuckle a bit as well. "Well, that's..." Ash tried to form something to say, "That actually might be pretty accurate..."

They all laughed again, even as Tomora was thinking of how immature it was.

Then she remembered after another few yards, "Oh! You didn't tell me, what's next?"

"Classes are over." Dustyn said.

"Yes, now we go to our rooms, to bath, then head to dinner."

As she looked out at the sky through the next available window, she realized how late it was. "What time does dinner start?" She asked, seemingly to the window.

"One of us will come get you." Dustyn said.

She nodded. "And after that, room-work and my punishments."

Ash smiled, and Dustyn said, "At least she's realistic." Ash nodded.

After a long pause with no more small talk, she said, "Well, this all wasn't that bad..."

"The first day is never that bad." Ash replied.

She gave him a look. "What makes you say that?" She asked bluntly. How could the first day not be bad?

"Well, the first day is shorter." Dustyn replied for his friend.

She blinked, and turned to face him instead. "What?"

"The first day." Ash said for himself. " It's shorter. We got to sleep in a few hours, to get used to the schedule again. They took off many of the weapons classes.

Her eyes widened, then after they returned to normal, she said, "Well crap," inspiring a laugh from Ash, who seemed to laugh at everything anyway.

Tomora smiled in return, trying to memorize the path the were taking. They continued with the small talk, most of it concerning court events that she knew nothing of, people she had no clue about. She just listened to bits of it, mostly thinking, not paying attention, though.

Soon enough she figured out where they were, and didn't need to follow to know her way back to her room. She still stayed with them, but she felt happy for the extra confidence, feeling that the chances of her making (another) fool of herself had lessened.

She waved when they all pealed off into there own rooms, trying to remember where they were for future reference. She was soon alone, being with her luck the last room. She didn't know what she was supposed to be doing... Oh, bathing, right? Goodness, how many baths did she need? In the morning is understandable, and after the practice, maybe, but all she had done these last hours was hold a quill, she wasn't dirty! And what was the point of bathing right before dinner, just to do homework and sleep, then wake up to bath again? She didn't like baths anyway, though truth to tell she had *just* started to take showers. Tom decided that from then on, she'd only bath after practice. So she wouldn't be so sticky....

Not knowing what to do with her time, she plopped down on her bed, tossing her glasses on the floor. Very suddenly she remembered that she could dress how she wanted at dinner. She was tempted to smile, though she didn't, but still immediately sprang up, to get dressed.

She opened the closet portion of her armoire, where the majority of her normal clothes hung. She pulled down her favorite pair of jeans; might as well dress her best on the first day, right? They were a medium blue, thick, durable denim. She had been wearing them for a few months, though, and had gotten them used from someone who had them for years, so they were pretty worn, making the cloth a bit thinner, but softer, and much more casual looking. She had of yet managed to prevent them from getting any holes in these particular MUDDs, though, so they were fine.

After some consideration, She pulled down a white t-shirt. It wasn't completely white, though. On the front was a short , three-inch-tall cartoon of a girl with a blond ponytail, holding a shining silver wrench. She also wore blue jeans and a white t-shirt. On the back, written in black graffiti, it seemed, bordered by golden yellow, it said JNCO in tagger's style.

She went into to privy, which didn't smell too much better than the Rancho Chaparral camp latrines, to get dressed. She just didn't trust the locks on her windows and her door, she guessed. Paranoid. Examining herself in the big mirror afterwards, she liked what she saw well enough. The jeans were too loose for her, so the top rim of her somewhere-between-forest-and- olive-green Hanes Her Way underwear could be seen. Well, that's what happens when you get all your clothes for free, right? And she didn't have a belt.

Well, there were her Tortallian belts, but those were basically just cords of soft, or cloth rope, and she wanted to wear authentic, 2001 a.d., average, everyday clothes, for the modern teenage girl, who isn't dressing up.

If her shirt had been long enough, it would have hidden the banner of green, but it was too short. It showed about and inch of her stomach. But all her shirts also did that, except for her uniform ones. It was still a modest shirt. The neck was smaller than most T-shirts, going right up against her neck. And the cloth was the thickest white material she had so far found, though it still wasn't perfect, of course.

She re-did her hair, and re-applied her eye shadow, seeing as it always wore off after just two hours. It wasn't great for long terms, but she wore it anyway... Only blue she had.

Bored again, she stood and looked around for no reason for a bit, then remembered her list. She found that bit of icky, nearly pre-historic history keeping parchment, not much caring for it, and an evil quill that schemed to have her make mistakes. On that 'paper' was a list, a *long* list, of all the things she wanted to remember to bring with her from the real world next trip. She added to the list many things, backpack, pencils, pens... But she underlined deodorant a few times. Practice wasn't kind to the nose...

She knew she was forgetting something, but she didn't particularly care, so she bounced back onto her bed and managed to read a few chapters before a knock came to her door. She rolled off the bed and onto her knees, then bent to corner of her current page while standing up, and threw the book onto to bed while walking to the door. She opened it to see Dustyn standing there. "Dinner?" she asked, and he nodded and started away, so she followed behind, trotting down the hall silently.

Tom gave up on tying to find topics to talk about with Dustyn when the reached the double doors, along with bunches of other kids, all who piled in and took what must have been their normal seats. Dustyn stopped in the door, looking for and quickly finding Ash and Airek at the end of the table, in the same seats as at lunch. They waved, and Dustyn and her traveled over to them.

Dustyn took his prior seat as well. Tomora put her hands on her hips. "No seat for me?" She asked, obviously not really upset. She said it because all the seats surrounding her friends were taken.

The odd look on Airek's and Ashlin's faces were nearly priceless. "Oh, I'm sorry, we thought you'd like to sit at the end like last time..."

"Y-yeah, we just, we can move if you'd like..."

She laughed. "No! I'm just teasing, I'm a creature of habit like the rest of the race, the end is fine. I'd prefer it, actually." She said, wondering what was wrong with them. She couldn't really be that scary... She'd expect it from Airek, he seemed to timid and shy, but why was Ashlin treating her like that?

She walked to the pile of extra chairs all stacked, mostly neatly, in the corner. Their weren't actually that many, and on had to wonder why they were there. You'd expect something like that from a simple school, but a royal palace was different... Didn't every room have to be perfect? But for whatever reason, they were there, and she took one for her own, and moved it to the end, and sat down with a certain lack of grace. She looked up to those ever staring and un-approving faces. "What?" She demanded of them.

"You- It's just- You've got-" All three of them mumbled and she could hear thing.

Ash was the first to come out and say it. "I'm not sure if you're aware of it, but you've got on a shirt that's far too small. You can, see, you've got skin showing."

"And you can't do that."

"And you can't have that." Ashlin agreed with Dustyn. Airek also expressed his agreement with a nod.

"Um, why the heck not?"

They were taken aback. After sharing a glance, they were certain that all of them had expected the same thing, for her to be embarrassed.

"Uhh...."

"Because it's just not done!" Dustyn said in exasperation.

"Yeah, you can't, you did it on purpose? It's... Unseemly..."

"Oh please! You sound like- er..." She realized that they *were* the old fashioned type, that they were this strict... "Never mind, point is, there's nothing wrong with it."

As they started to interrupt again, about modesty and properness, and it just not being right, but she blocked them off in turn. " Stop it! I have a freakin' stomach!" She stood up, and lifted the front of her shirt a bit, to show it to them. On her stomach she had three big freckles, or small moles, that formed a perfect right triangle, one to each side of her belly button, and another above the one on her left, but that really wasn't important. " I have a stomach!" She repeated. " And guess what? So do you! And so does he! Everyone has a stomach!" She said, not really knowing which 'he' she was talking about, but she knew it would be true either way, so that also didn't really matter.

She yanked up both Ash's and Dustyn's shirts a little ways, one in each hand, before finally realizing that they were standing. And so was everyone else. Why would they be- and why hadn't she noticed before that everyone in the room was silent? Dropping her hands from her friend's shirts, she finally saw that His Ever So Royal Highness was halfway from walking from the door to the dais, where he would no doubted make a speech. But he had stopped, and was watching the commotion with everyone else. His face was well trained, but his eyes quite clearly showed his amusement.

Tomora raised her voice even more. "And now that I have all of your attention!" She started, "I'd like you all to be quiet and respectful, for the king has just joined us! What is wrong with all of you, going on chatting like that, have you no shame?" With that she fell into line, standing like the rest of them, but not without saying, half under her breath, but forgetting how well sound traveled in this room, "And for the record, he has a tummy, too... And there's nothing wrong with that... Just like everybody poops..."

As Jonathan quirked a smile and continued his route, and many boys had trouble containing their laughter. Despite herself she felt a sneaky blush, though she tried not to. Fortunately, the king called back all the room's attention, so few noticed. As was tradition, he made his first-day-back, dinner speech. He started it by telling them that he's keep it short for their benefit, as always, and made sure it had it's share of jokes. Everyone who thought the jokes were funny didn't laugh, out of the respect they thought they had to show. Those who didn't find the all the funny laughed the most, in the suck-up way.

Kenret was thinking too loud, and managed not to hear much of what Jon said. She did this often, and already quite a bit today, mostly during her lessons when she really shouldn't. She wasn't thinking about anything particularly pressing, only about how she could have handled that situation so much better... She snapped out of it and back into her present surrounding as she heard Airek laugh loudly. She barely heard a peep out of the guy all day, so she hadn't expected to hear him barking out any laughs.

Apparently, the king was talking about equality at the time. "-se I think that one of our newest pages said it best when she said-" He continued, very dramatically, each word slowly and clearly pronounced, "'Everyone, has, a stomach.'" He started clapping as everyone laughed, disrespectful or not. He made a small nod and turned around to set himself for dinner, but turned back around when everyone's laughter was renewed.

The subject of there continued laughter was the girl whom he had quoted. Tomora had stood up and taken a low bow after everyone looked at her, and they found this amusing. She caught Jon's eyes and gestured that he should do the same, so he gave medium bow as well. Again he started to turn back only to stop himself as Tom got up from the table and started to walk towards him. She stepped up next to him and took his hand, then faced the crowd and bowed, theatre style, taking him with her. She lifted there joined hands by bending them at the elbows, then swept them back down, moving her body parallel to it. She nodded and informed him he needed to learn how to properly lengthen the applause time, something about being in a 'play', and trotted back to her seat, waving to everyone before she sat down.

~~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The rest of dinner went calmly, after Kenret's 'little' scene. Ashlin didn't know what to think. This Kenret girl was so... not normal. She'd never last. It was a shame. She certainly made things much more entertaining around here.

She was very... What did she call it? Dramatic and opinionated? He could see that. Though it did mostly seem as if she was just argumentative. His youngest sister was like that. Nothing she enjoyed more than trying to prove some one wrong. Though Kenret's arguments made much more sense than his sister's. And when she was agreeable, calm even, she seemed to know a lot about things that mattered. So she was an intelligent argument-addicted girl? Maybe.

Everything about her was strange... That wasn't her fault most likely, just the fault of where she came from. Her world sounded fascinating... Unlike anything the scholars could tell him of the past cultures, nor was it like what the Old Ones had envisioned in the far future. Carriages without horses? Crossbows that don't need to be reloaded and can go eighty times as far? What a laugh... Televisions, microwave ovens, refrigerators, what ever those were... It sounded much more likely.

Even now, he was patently letting her explain the concepts of the theatre between her eating her food and complaining about it's poor preparation. It seemed the theatre wasn't quite like movies or television, but close. A little. She was really very hard to follow... Actually, in that aspect she reminded him a little of the math teacher.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

After dinner they all went back to their rooms, to bathe. Well, Tomora just read. They had just invited her to join them in the room they all did their little study group stuff, and sat down in what she assumed to be their usual places (with allowance for her) when a messenger came and called her to Padraig's office. She left with everyone wishing her luck, and silently and slowly followed the messenger guy-dude-person.

Padraig smiled up from his seat at his desk, though only with his eyes. And it was nice to see that he didn't do that dramatic, was- looking-out-the-window-but-turns-a-moment-after-you-come-in thing. That was sooo overused....

"Sit down, Page Tomora. I hear we have some special situations with you." As she obediently sat down and kept a calm face, he continued. "You're teachers have given me some interesting reports on your progress today. The first reports I got are as good of a place to start as any, right? Let's see, first is..." He glanced down at some papers on the desk. "Oh, yes. Sergent Ezeko wasn't all too... Pleased, with you, if you will."

It was obvious he wasn't done talking, but he was done with his sentence so she interrupted while she could still plead ignorance. He was talking too fast, anyway. "Was I inadequate in my performance, sir?"

His face stayed perfectly trained, but he obviously found her false, owled-eyed innocent look and voice amusing. "No, actually, he admitted that though your ways were a little strange and you'd have to be trained out of them, it's only to be expected from one coming from, well, a far way away. He did, however, say that you were in great need of etiquette lessons, and that I should inform the Etiquette master of that."

"Did he say that? I can't imagine why... Hey!" She said, sarcastic before she interrupted herself. "No wonder that pu- er, particular teacher was so upset with me right at first..."

Padraig only cocked an eye. "Was he? I hadn't told him what Ezeko's wishes were, yet."

Tom blinked a bit. "Oh. Ummm..... Oops?"

She liked Padraig. It was hard not to like a guy who tried so hard and failed so badly at hiding his amusement.

"Yes, well, we shall get to that later. The next subject that needs addressing is your writing class. He says you know as much as any scholar and he doesn't quite know what to do with you. Until he gets that assignment in a week and derives from it what you need practice in, if any at all, you're going to have a lot of free time during his class. I-"

Tomora interrupted, wishing he'd talk slower. "Really? What happens if my paper is completely satisfactory?"

Padraig frown the tiniest of bits at being interrupted. "I suppose you could use that time to do some other constructive study, such as-"

"But it would still technically be free time, to do what I will?"

"Yes, and don't interrupt you betters, Page Tomora."

As he opened his mouth to say something more, she said, "Yes, sir." Metally deciding to have the paper done before she went to bed.

"I'm not a knight."

"What does that ha- Oh! Pah, keep forgetting. Yes, um, yeah, yes."
He continued. " Your Mathemetics Master tells me that your knowledge is far more than satisfactory. You may also have that time to yourself, until we come up with something for you to do during that time. Your history and law master informs me that you are lacking a unfortunately large portion of your education in that area. Perhaps you could best use your free time to catch up in that. I'm afraid that Sir Myles may seem like he will be picking on you, but try to remember that he is only trying to help.

"Lindhall says you knew everything he threw at you, but it'll take about a month before he'll know what you need to know, or just pop you out, like the rest.

"This world you come from seems to educate it's youth very well." He said spontaneously, popping Tom out of her daydreams by his suddenly informal voice and then silence. {I suppose I should be paying attention... He needs to stop talking so fast, though...} " Yes, they try, but i still say the public schools suck." She said absently.

Padraig nodded as if expecting the answer, though couldn't possibly have. "Master Oakbridge was not... Satisfied with your performance. You will be spending an hour of your free time, the second hour after dinner, with him every day until your knowledge has improved.

*That* woke her up. She sat up straight, eyes wide, mouth open to say something, but he continued. "Starting tomorrow. You are also to wait on him at dinner."

He paused, Tom expecting him to continue. "Page Tom?"

"Oh." He was done. "Yes sir..." She said, meekly.

"You may go." He said, not bothering to correct her.

"Aye sir."

Tomora trudge off rather meekly to rejoin her friends. The were *very* sympathetic, believing that that was a horrible punishment indeed. Much worse than just mucking the stables. The congratulated her on the good news, envious of the spare time she'd get, if only for awhile.

She left after awhile to find a library. She couldn't concentrate on her paper with them talking, and she wanted to get a good grade, or, good whatever they got, seeing as how it would determine what she'd be doing with a great deal of her time. She thought she'd have it done by the next morning, but she had been wrong. She was too under-informed on the subject to just write, she had to look things up, which was hard in an ancient library. For her, at least.

She got pretty fair, but decided to give up and go to bed. She wasn't used to getting up before noon, much less before the sun itself rose. She wasn't sure if she was allowed to take the books she had been researching with, so she planned to leave them there and just copy noted from the to take with her. She gave up after half a page of copying, though, so she tucked them under her arm and went to bed, not looking forward to morning.

~*~

Author's Note: GAH, that was a long chappie! I do absolutely promise i will not take this much time to update again. Really. And, uh... If you've gotten this far, thank you SO much for taking the time to read this all, and leave a review, of course. It's very hard for me to motivate myself to write when I know no one is reading my story... *sigh*

I had hundreds of Author's Notes to do, but I've deciding not to. I remember a author I criticized (not meanly) for putting too many A/Ns in the actual story, then here I found myself tempted to do so very many times. Except for once or twice, I believe I succeeded. But I know what to apologize to that author, whomever she may be.

I was also going to leave notes to all the people who reviewed, but I have changed my mind. In later chapters there's going to be a certain emotion the chapter will leave with the reader (that's the plan, anyway) and notes will ruin that feeling, so I will refrain from doing any at all, if I can.

The only three author notes of at least forty that I was going to leave is that 1) I realized after I wrote the getting-dressed scene that Kenret would note be wearing the gold tunic uniform, but the padded practice clothes. I was going to fix this, but it hurt to delete the scene, so I just decided that hey, this is just a fanfic, it doesn't have to be perfect.

2) In my head, Tom is always called Kenret. Before, I called her Tom in Tortall and Kenret in the states, but now, she'll just be Kenret. I keep getting the two confused, and it's a hassle.

and 3) not now, but later in the fic, I'm going to be adding background music to certain scenes. in my head, this whole thing is a movie and... v.v;; yeah. So, I won't do it often, but once in a while it's going to say the name of a song, and I want you to know why.

The reason this chapter was so long was because it was the first one that felt natural. I hate my other chapters, and they felt so forced. This time, however, they just did there thing, I just wrote it down.

My good friend informed me that this is WAY too long, and, I agree. Towards the end, as I'm sure many of you can tell, I controlled myself better and didn't do quite so many details. I'll be better next time, promise. I just got carried away. I'll fix it, really I will. I know there are many grammatical errors, typos, and other such, and I'll correct those in time, but for now I just want to get the chapter up!

This will be a good story, really it will (vain as it sounds) but I'm novice, so please, just stick with me. Kenret is going to have a very adventurous life.

Then I'll be doing the sequel. ^^

Thank you all again.

-Kykio