CHAPTER 2: First Day

The next morning, Alanna awoke laggardly to a knock at her door. Her legs ached from the week-long ride from Trebond. Carefully, she touched the pool of her Gift, using a slight droplet on her thighs. She would hate to lose control of as sneaky a thing as magic, and therefore used as little as possible. In seconds, the pain had vanished. With a depressed moan, she stumbled over to open the door, too tired to care how rude her irritable glower, frizzy hair, and crumpled nightgown looked.

A tall girl with brown hair and eyes curtsied politely in the hallway. "Good morning. I'm Rowanna—Rowanna of Disart. I trust you slept well?"

Great, Alanna thought crossly, I'm stuck with an etiquette-obsessed freak. "No," she replied flatly.

"That's what it's usually like the first couple of nights. I got used to it. Are you hungry? Breakfast is downstairs—"

"No, I'm not hungry."

"Well, at least come down to the dining room with me. The girls are dying to see you—"

"Looking like this? You must be crazy."

"Hmm." Rowanna paused thoughtfully, thinking as she inspected her. Then she nodded. "Here, let me help you. I suggest washing your face and getting dressed. I'll do your hair."

Alanna stared at her, wide-eyed. "That's really not needed—"

"No, no, really, I insist. We have to hurry so we're not late. Come on." And with that, she hustled a shocked Alanna back into her room.

---

Alanna stared at herself in the mirror in horror. She looked like a lady. She didn't look half that bad.

Turning to face Rowanna, who watched her far too calmly, she skirted her eyes to the bed. "Listen. About earlier—I, er—I didn't mean to be so, er, gruff. I was tired, is all."

"It's no problem—really. I mean, I don't understand it, exactly, but—oh well. You look great."

Alanna opened her mouth to snap that she didn't want to look great, and, on changing her mind, closed it again. This Disart girl acted too quietly for her.

"Are you ready to go downstairs—meet a couple of girls? Make a few friends?"

"I don't need friends."

"Now that is stupid. Of course you need friends. You think you'll survive six years surrounded by strangers?"

"I'm not staying six years."

"Oh, and where might you be going?"

"I'm going to become a spy." The words were out of her mouth before she knew what she was saying. She tensed, waiting for the blow of ridicule and laughter.

Rowanna thought this over for a moment, and then commented, "You mean, like a warrior in disguise?"

Alanna jumped, startled. "Yeah? What if that's what I mean?"

"Do you know how to act in that disguise?"

Alanna frowned, taken aback by the tranquil reply. "That's easy. Simply giggle a lot and talk about marriage and fashion. Combine that with fluttering my eyelashes at the guys, and I'm good."

Rowanna raised her eyebrows and opened the door to the hallway. "Have you heard me giggle or even slightly mention marriage or fashion this morning?"

Alanna stared at her as they left the room. Now that she thought about it, she hadn't heard her comment on children or her heart's deepest crushes either.

"Fashion and marriage don't sum up being a lady, Alanna. There're also manners. Do you know how to curtsy, play an instrument, or sing? Do you know anything about fashion or marriage?"

Alanna blushed and shook her head. "No, but it can't be that hard to talk about, can it?"

Rowanna shook her head. "Let's just say you have a lot to learn." They arrived at two giant doors, and she swung one open. "Time for breakfast."

The meal sped by, starting with introductions to Rowanna's friends, second-year Jessica of Mirsin and first-year Cythera of Elden, and ending with a dash to Rowanna's room to grab her books before classes began.

The classrooms were all located in one big corridor. The youngest sorcerers- and priests-in-training and ladies used these while fourth-years and above studied in the cloisters or elsewhere in the convent, if they didn't have an arranged governess to spend their last three years with.

The first two classes were Tortallan, where Alanna would perfect her speech and literacy, and math; she left them staggering under humungous textbooks for hours of homework that night.

"I'm dead," she announced, carelessly dropping the volumes on a bench in the hallway. "I already have a year's worth of work to do, and I'm supposed to finish it all plus more for tomorrow."

"That's okay," Cythera assured her. "No one expects anyone to keep up. If you do, you're a goddess."

"But when exactly am I expected to do this?" she demanded.

"My cousin calls it free time," Rowanna answered. "He says that, at the palace—"

"You mean he's studying to become a knight?" Alanna interrupted eagerly.

"That's right. He's a fourth-year page."

Would I have met him, Alanna wondered suddenly, if I had gone to the palace? Would we have been friends like Rowanna and me? Will Thom meet him and like him? She noted to remember the name so she could question her brother about him later on.

The next class was one Alanna fancied skipping.

"The class where the Gifted learn to use their Gift, the Sighted to See, the Healers to Heal, and the rest of us normal people to meditate and about theory and history. Taught by Daughter Marinstha, who just arrived three weeks ago. Do everything she says, and do not go all cheeky on her. I swear, the woman could be a Master if she wished it. Unfortunately, she doesn't wish it," Rowanna sighed.

"Why unfortunately?" Alanna asked curiously.

"Because if she did, then she could go away and study and we'd get a new teacher. Do you have the Gift?"

"Yes, but I don't like to use it."

Rowanna snorted. "Good luck getting that one past Marinstha. Give her the slightest reason to watch you, and she'll hound you like a gods-cursed terrier."

Just then, the Daughter stood up from her desk. The room silenced instantly and everyone was seated at their desks in a matter of seconds.

Daughter Marinstha took one look at Alanna and handed her a thick, musty book. "Maude told me about your Gift-class antics," she told her coolly, stern blue eyes locked with Alanna's own. "They'll stop at once. The book will be read by the end of the week. You may begin now."

The first chapter was about control. It was pleasantly appealing. Before, Alanna had hated using her Gift in fear of losing control, but this book said she was more likely to lose control if she didn't use it!

Afterwards, they headed for deportment, where Alanna's stomach churned in dread. This was where she learned to be a boy-hunting babbler, a disgrace to the human race.

She spent the next hour being proven wrong. The lesson went briskly, like its teacher. Everything seemed to be planned out perfectly. After an hour-long lecture on good posture and how she could become crippled if she didn't use it and what people would think of her if she did, she left the class confused.

"You were expecting frills and giggles again, weren't you? You were expecting to be taught to gossip," Rowanna sighed.

Alanna frowned, and then nodded. "Yeah, pretty much."

"Listen, Alanna, being a lady is not half that bad. I mean, true, many of us could not take down an attacking wolf, but that doesn't mean that we don't have a whole brain between us."

"But ladies have to be prim and dainty, and can't speak our minds or do anything fun like jousting—and, really, Rowanna, it's just so much more fun to be a knight—"

Rowanna froze. "Wait, wait, wait—what's this knight thing? I thought you wanted to become a spy!"

Alanna groaned. Why did she have to let her tongue slip? "Come on. Let's go drop off our stuff and go to lunch. I'll explain."

"You had better. You're too confusing not to be explained."

"Okay. So my mother dies giving birth to Thom and me. My father is too rolled up in his scrolls to allow any time for us, so we're handed off to Maude, the village healer, and Coram, a long-time family servant. Well, Coram has to teach Thom the basics of the fighting arts, and he says that to teach one twin is to teach the other, so, then, obviously, he has to teach me, too. Well, I turn out to be a really good student, unlike Thom. Thom wanted—wants—to become a sorcerer. Becoming a lady was the last thing on my list of to-dos, so we decided to switch places: he'd come here to study magic, and I'd go to the palace to become a knight. Well, my father overheard us, and we couldn't go through with it."

"It never would have worked, Alanna—you're a girl. Girls aren't allowed to become knights. Girls are naturally weaker than boys."

"How would you know? Have you ever seen a girl with the same training as a boy?"

"But we can't go off to war. We need to be here to, er... repopulate our country if something bad happens."

"I'm not going to do any 'repopulation'! I don't want to marry or have children or be reduced to a lady's duties! Women are just as good as men and should have just as much freedom as they do."

"We do—"

"Tell me, Rowanna: have you ever tried wearing breeches?"

Rowanna's jaw dropped. "Me? Are you joking? Of course not, I'm a lady!"

"Well I have, and they offer a thousand times more freedom than these skirts."

Rowanna gaped at her younger friend, and then asked slowly, "What would be the point, besides showing you're equal to men, of learning to fight? We're not battling anyone right now."

"Just because we're not in war now doesn't mean we'll never be," Alanna answered evenly. "An extra warrior can always make a difference on the battlefront. Why do you think men become knights? So they can laze about with honor? No, it's so they can be there and know they would be of help if there's trouble."

"Okay, then, what else?"

"Defense."

"Defense from what? We're nobles, Alanna—we're rich enough to hire guards."

"Do you want a bodyguard following you every single place you go? What if you're alone with your bodyguard and he turns on you? Or he gets killed? Then what will you do? Wild animals and rapists don't respond as well as you'd like to begging, Rowanna. And what if you see someone else being hurt? Will you just stand there and let it happen? Scream, perhaps? Run away, cry, faint? You certainly can't help the person because you don't know how. Wouldn't it be great if you could—even if it were just once—stand up to someone and know that you are physically able to beat him if he attacks you, instead of standing there helplessly?"

Rowanna blinked and frowned. "This is crazy. I've never heard anything like this. My mother and aunts and cousins—just think of what they would say! Think of what Grandmother Sebila, who's been listing marriageable men off for me since before I was born, would say!" Suddenly, she grinned. "Alright, I'm with you!"

Alanna blinked. "Come again?"

"Well, didn't you say you were going to be heroic? I'm going to be heroic too—with you."

"And how do you plan to pull off that one?"

Rowanna bit her lip shyly. "You have to hear me through this, okay? It can work, I swear. Even if it takes a lot of work. What we have to do is talk to the Daughter of the Crooked God. She goes to town a lot to talk with all the thieves—you know, because the Crooked God is the patron of thieves—so she knows them. She could get us hooked up with some teachers, since thieves are great fighters."

Alanna stared at her. "You're crazier than I am."

"It can work, Alanna, I promise! Come on, please? You got me into this in the first place. Now I'm all excited."

Alanna rubbed her head. "I don't know…."

"All it will take is for us to be on our best behavior and get granted some free time. That means that I have to get caught up with my homework and you need to stay caught up, and then we'll be rewarded."

"That's going to take a lot of work."

"All it's going to take is working every chance we have. We can work during mealtimes, because we often have so much spare time between servings, and that's great, because a quick break every now and then makes studying easier. And we'll have to work late into the night, which is kind of against the rules, but no one has to find out."

"I'm not impressed."

Rowanna sighed dramatically. "Well, I guess if you want to grow up to be some random, silly lady…."

"Fine!" Alanna cried, the gross image of a giggling girl dancing at a ball causing her stomach to churn. She took a deep breath, and let it out definitively. "Let's do this."