The training master growled, but ignored her comment. She cursed in her mind, keeping her face bare of emotion or recognition. As she filed out of the Mess with the other pages, she thought about how on Earth and by all the Gods she was going to pull this off.

It was bad enough being a girl and pretending to be a boy for the next eight years, naturally, but not nearly as bad on her conscience that she was not as ready for it as the others were. The only good thing about the fact that she was a girl at this point in time was that she probably possessed more neurons in an inch of her head than these guys in the brains they possessed themselves. She also had the upper hand on her concealment: she knew what was coming whenever she became a woman, and would know how to disguise it. She was also two years younger than the pages, who were all ten, and thus her chest would not being to grow for a very long while. Hopefully it would come to pass once she became a squire and could be up and about making sure no one noticed.

The one thing that troubled her more than anything was her papers. Naturally, all nobles who applied to be knights had to have papers to certify it to be so. The papers she had forged were without fault, obviously, and were not her concern. Her concern were the ones that her father still held in his castle. Magical disguise or no, her father would be able to see through it right away. If he did, and showed Jonathon the papers, she was worse than royally screwed.

As she got in her rooms, Ty set about making sure there was no way anyone could see her from outside. She must still be cautious. Numair undoubtedly could sense magic, and boys could peek in. wariness was in deep need.

She crawled over to the basin in the corner, sitting on a small table, and washed her face. She then placed both hands inside the dish and closed her eyes. Once her senses gave her the all clear and she could hear no noise, she let them go...

Ty felt her head pound. She had learnt a great deal from her magic last night, but with the bindings and spells in her room, letting her senses back inside a pounding skull had been difficult. Her head felt like it had been between a hammer and an anvil as they tried to forge a sword.

She quickly got out of bed and ran for her towel. Once this was done, she stood before her mirror and checked herself. I knew it, she sighed mentally. I am never doing that in here again! Ever!

She could not risk her real appearance showing itself off when her magic could not return to meet the deadline. Her true black hair had returned, as had her dark skin and her even darker eyebrows. Her long lashes curled too obviously in the sign on female beauty, though she denied being beautiful with a will as she did everything else, and her true eye-color was also back. Silver-rimmed blood-red hues stared back at her.

She reached within her for her magic, then remembered she had locked it. She cursed herself once more. She couldn't look like this as she went outside! It would give her away!

She took up a braid at the very back of her skull and twisted it carefully. A tiny amount of silver liquid sprouted from it. Fabulous. The binding on hit had broken upon its rush to return to its proper place. Dash it all!

She carefully undid the end of the braid and a surge of energy ran through her arm. Doing it up again with great haste, she asked her magic to lie still. Once the braid was made up, she took her arm and placed it on the mirror. Praying the mage was not yet awake; she willed her image to change.

It did. She now looked like the boy who had been outspoken at dinner. Grand.

Taking up her towel, she ran towards the Bathing House. No one there. She was truly in luck today. As she scrubbed viciously and re-magicked her hair, she prayed to the Goddess her luck would hold.

She quickly dressed and shot from the Bathing House. Drawing a sign in front of her, she called the name of Mael, who woke. She hid in a corner as she waited for him to come down to the Bathing House. She waited for only a while until he came, his towel over his shoulder. As he did, she dashed to the entrance of the House and began to walk calmly back to her rooms.

As planned, he saw her as she walked past. "Where are you off to, page? The Bathing House is that way."

Ty laughed. "I'm aware," she commented with the air of one talking of the weather. "I've just been there. Please excuse me, my before-training awaits me, as does my breakfast."

Mael raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. "I await you outside the Mess, page," he said. "You and I are in need of a word."