Briareth knocks on the door. Not loudly, but loud enough to be noticed by anyone inside. We hear footsteps coming to the door, and then someone opens it. His hair is short, pale, and slightly ruffled like he forgot to comb it this morning. He isn’t short, but he isn’t tall either. He observes us through the doorway, his clever calculating green eyes taking in Briareth and I through his wire rimmed glasses. “You must be my new roommates.” He says. “Nice to meet you, I’m Adamar Erhorn.” He holds out his hand and Briareth immediately grabs it and gives a hearty shake.

“Nice to meet you too! I’m Briareth Herbalar, and this is my friend and current traveling companion Faladel Mithrandir.” Once he extracts his hand from Briareth’s grip he places it in front of me to shake, I acquiesce. His grip is firm, his smile seems genuine, and he doesn’t seem to even notice my memorable last name. I think I like our roommate.

“Come inside, have you two already been in here?”

“Yes.” Says Briareth. “We picked our beds too.”

“Excellent. How late do you mind me keeping the light on? I have a nasty test in Runes tomorrow and I want to study as much as I can.”

“Ehh, I can sleep through pretty much anything.” Briareth says.

“Ten’s my limit. I want to get some sleep.” I add in.

“Great. That gives me a little over two hours. I only heard that I would be getting roommates right before supper, sorry the room wasn’t clean when you visited earlier. Anyways, when I heard that I would be getting roommates I came up with a couple icebreaker games to play, if you two don’t mind of course?” He lilts the end questioningly as if he isn’t quite sure what to do with us. “I can understand if you two are completely tired out from all the traveling and running around campus you’ve been doing…” He trails off uncertainly.

“I’ll play.” I say, settling down on the floor as Adamar grabs a box by his desk. “But don’t you have studying to do?”

“Consider it as me taking a break. I rate potential friends as higher importance than a test I may naturally get a good grade on if fortune favors me. Also, I was planning for one game only, I didn’t prepare enough questions for anything else.”

“So what’s the rules of this game?” Briareth says, plopping down beside us.

“The game’s called Wildcraft.” He says, unpacking the box and taking out a folded up board, a bunch of cards, some player pieces, a wooden six sided die, and some black and blue slips of paper. “The goal of this game is to get from grandma’s house, to the huckleberry patch, and back before the sun sets. We're supposed to work as a team…” As Adamar explains the rules I observe the room as a whole. It appears that he has cleaned up since the last time we were in here. The wooden action figures are still there, but the pile of books and papers on his desk is much more neat and his bed is made.

Adamar eventually finishes his long winded explanation of the game with, “Normally, whenever you land on the purple squares you would get a story piece, but instead I’ve prepared icebreaker questions. You guys ready to play?”

“Totally!” Briareth says, looking excited. We each take a player piece, Briareth grabs yellow, Adamar goes for the blue, so I’m left with purple. We begin to play, and soon enough, Briareth is the first to get a question. It reads, ‘What is your favorite thing about this game so far?’

“Oh come on, we just started.” He complains. “Do I have to answer this one? Can’t I reshuffle and draw another?”

“No Briareth, that’s the rules.” I admonish. “Answer it.”

“Well, the concept of it probably.” Adamar and I give him a blank look. “It’s not like other games which try to be competitive. This one is all about working together, it completely breaks the mold of most games nowadays and I like that.”

Adamar blinks, “That is not quite the answer I was expecting, but this is all about being honest, and getting to know each other, so that isn’t a bad thing.”

We play for a bit longer, Adamar gets the next question. “‘How old are you and what is your favorite color?’ Oh yeah, I thought since the first question on there was so easy I should combine it with another easy one. I think I’m currently two-hundred-and-thirty-eight years old. My favorite color is lilac with light blue faded into it.”

“Two-hundred-and-thirty-eight?!” Briareth exclaims, “Why are you still in school?”

“I only reached the power levels necessary to get into Mossblossom Central recently. Besides, it isn’t like there is an age restriction, and no one is ever too old to learn something new right?” Adamar shrugs, passing on the dice.

“Very true.” I say smiling. Briareth frowns though.

“Does that mean that there is alcohol in the buffet and I never noticed?”

“No, drinking is forbidden on campus.” Adamar answers raising his eyebrows. “I would have thought you would have noticed that in the rule book.”

“Ah, I may have burned mine after I thought I wasn’t coming back here.” Briareth mumbles

I was the next one to get a question. “‘Who is a person you admire?’” I read allowed. “Hmm… I think the most relevant person here is my Father, but Raegel works as well.”

“What? You barely know Raegel. Why do you admire him?” Briareth says, taking the bait. “You knew him for maybe five hours. That isn’t a lot of time to get to know someone.”

“Well I know that he managed to put up with you the entire time that he trained you and kept you under control.” I grin. Adamar snorts.

“Oof! You got me there, Faladel.” Briareth smiles at my jibe good naturedly.

Adamar is the next one to get a question. “This one was meant for you guys, ‘What is your least favorite class so far?’ I wasn’t expecting to have to answer it. My least favorite class? Ugh. Um... probably tactics. I’d swear the tests are never about what we covered in class, and my textbook has some really lewd doodles in it from a past user.”

“You can pay attention in Tactics? I would have said Art.” Briareth says.

“Really, what’s wrong with Art? I’ve heard rather good things about Master Kolvar.” Adamar queries.

“He’s creepy. This girl named Lyra Aumrauth was having a glaring war with Faladel, and he just appeared right behind her, and made her stop. She appears to hate Faladel for some reason.”

“Have you met her before that meeting?” Adamar asks me.

“I saw her in Techie Magic two, but I didn’t interact with her. I’ve never talked or met with her before that, at least not that I remember.” I reply. “She just seems to hate me for no reason.”

“I could look into it if you’d like.” Adamar offers. “I have various, ah… sources around the school. I could probably figure out what her problem is.”

“That would be great,” I say smiling “but Briareth’s friend Folas apparently already knows. He was supposed to tell us at supper.”

“Oh, you’re friends with Folas, Briareth? Were you in the same year?” Adamar asks.

“Yep. I was so glad when I saw him at lunch today. Made the rest of the day a lot easier.” Briareth confirms. We continue moving our pieces around some more. In around an hour the game finishes. We got back to Grandma’s house with all the huckleberries. We all won. I wish real life could be that easy. I don’t know what to expect of tomorrow with my lack of power being public. I hope people just don’t care. But the more I think about it, the less likely that outcome seems.

----------------------------------------

When we get up the next morning, there's a small package outside the door. It is addressed to Briareth and I. Briareth opens it, and inside is a note written in a rather old script and four pairs of clothes. The note reads, ‘I noticed yesterday that both of your clothes were in rather bad shape, so I had some servants make you some new ones. I hope I got your sizes right.’ H.M.M.H.

Briareth and I try them on of course, then ask Adamar how we look. Adamar bursts out laughing. “Who sent you these? Is this a practical joke?!”

“What’s wrong with them?” I ask.

“Did you even look at them when you put them on? They are ridiculous!” I glance at Briareth’s clothes and chuckle, then I glance down at my own and am completely astonished. I was sure my clothes were a nice brown jerkin with brown pants and a green vest. Now it is completely white, and it has a cravat! A cravat! I don’t even know how to tie a cravat. They are so old fashioned that not even someone over five hundred would use them.

“How did this get here? I didn’t put on a cravat.” I say. Briareth is looking at his own clothes and giggles softly. He and I look like two peas in a pod, in clothes at least.

“I can guess who H. M. M. H. is.” He says. “This is totally something he would do. Don’t worry Faladel. This is probably just a temporary illusion. Adamar, I suppose you have a laundry basket for our dirty clothes?”

“Yes, it’s right over here. Who’s H. M. M. H.?” Adamar asks, confused.

“The person who sent us these. Have the spells worn off yet?” Briareth asks.

“Your’s seems to have.” I reply. “We should probably head down for breakfast. Want to come along Adamar?”

“As long as you don’t mind one of my other friends joining us, sure.”

We head down to breakfast, most conversations hush as we pass. I’m not quite sure why, surely the students have had their fill of us. Yes, we are the new kids, but we won’t be staying for long, and wasn’t that fight yesterday in midair more interesting? Apparently not. When we arrive at the-I still don’t know what this area is called, I’ll just call it Grand Dining Hall. Well when we arrive a wave of silence washes out from the point of our entry and eventually covers the entire hall. We make our way to Folas, and Adamar waves over one of his friends.

Folas and Valkallyn are sitting together along with a couple students we don’t know. Briareth and I exchange niceties with Folas, and then go to get some breakfast. When we come back our table is a lot fuller, and the surrounding tables are completely empty. Is something wrong?

We settle ourselves down next to Adamar who somehow has managed to gather his friends and his breakfast and return before us. Folas, Valkallyn, and some others are sitting across from us.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

“Briareth!” Folas exclaims in excitement over the chattering ruckus that surrounds us, “You never got to the part about the dragon last night! Let’s hear the rest of the tale.”

Briareth begins a retelling of our encounter with Smay. I don’t need to hear it and just tune him out along with the aimless chatter that surrounds us. I turn to Adamar for an answer about the tables. He basically said he has a spy network last night, so he probably knows what this is about. He is having a light breakfast of tea and biscuits, sipping silently while he watches the chaos around him interestedly.

“Adamar, do you know why everyone migrated to our table or fled from it as if we had the plague?”

“I don’t know, but I have a hunch. I’m surprised you didn’t catch on to the same idea. Perhaps people are more subtle at court though.”

“What’s your hunch?” I press, somehow even more confused now.

Adamar puts down his teacup, “Well, it is my personal belief that people are beginning to separate into factions around you.”

“Around me?” I’m flabbergasted, why would I be a point of separation?

“Well of course you, it can’t be Briareth. Briareth doesn’t have the power that you do.”

“But why are they splitting up into factions?”

“Well, from what I’ve heard, there is a lot of controversy in the government right now about the war effort. A lot of people want to work out another temporary peace, others insist we must wipe the Dwarves off the planet. Your father hasn’t made a decision one way or another. Some see you as a way to influence his decision. After all, you just returned from over twenty years in prison, surely you would know if the Dwarves would be open to a treaty. But also you could easily call for revenge on the Dwarves. Technically you haven’t declared anything on the matter, which means that people think you could be persuaded to take one side or another.”

His explanation sounds quite reasonable, but I spot one small flaw. “That explains the crowding, but not the avoidance of the other faction.” I say gesturing to the other crowded tables that are practically as far from us as possible.

“Ah. them.” Adamar takes a bite of his biscuit, chews for a while, and then swallows and continues. “They think you have already decided, well most of them. Others just don’t like the attention you are getting, and a few are out for revenge for perceived slights or actions your family has taken.”

“Politics.” I sigh. “I didn’t think I would have to deal with this till I got back to court.” Adamar grimances in sympathy.

“I don’t envy you, Faladel. Even I don’t like this much politicking, though goodness knows I love to meddle. When I get curious on a topic I don’t stop until I find my answer or someone gets hurt.”

“Is that what happened with the mushrooms?”

“You could say that.” He doesn’t seem to be surprised that I know of that incident. Then again he has his personal spy network, and believes me to be smart. Maybe he thinks I also have ‘sources’ set up here. I listen to Briareth finish the tale with me bumping into an invisible branch, and the appearance of a bunch of wizards. Folas laughs gleefully, and some people who had stopped talking amongst themselves to listen, laugh along with him. They then realize that the story is at its end though, and so continue on with their conversations.

“Now it’s your turn Folas,” Briareth finishes, “What was up with Lyra Aumrauth yesterday? What’s her story?” I immediately turn to pay attention to this conversation. I notice Adamar doing the same.

“From what I’ve heard, her boyfriend, Ryfon Narebeth, died about a month ago.” Folas begins. “He was a great wizard, an alumnus of this school in fact, but he decided to enlist in the army. He was moved up in the ranks because of his wizard training, but his battalion got ambushed because of a mistake that no one caught. The orders went right through the King’s hands and he signed off on it. Everyone in that company was killed, including Ryfon. Lyra holds the entire royal family responsible for that incident, and because Faladel is part of the Royal family, he is included in the hatred.”

“He was in jail at the time. Can’t she just let him off?” Briareth complains.

“Apparently not. He is a byproduct of the bureaucracy that got her boyfriend killed after all. Additionally, they sent her the body.”

“What? Why?” I interject. “I thought those were supposed to be sent to the next of kin?”

“His parents were killed in an earlier raid while they were in a vacationing home on the border. Ryfon was in school at the time, it was one of the reasons he enlisted after he graduated. He had no extended family or siblings. She was the closest they could find.” Folas finishes solemnly. “The information was rather easy to find. Ryfon only graduated last year, lots of people were here when Lyra received the body. She was heartbroken. The two really loved each other.”

“That, is incredibly sad.” I say frowning slightly. “No wonder she hates me.” The bell rings. Briareth offers to grab all our plates, and I gratefully take him up on it. “Where do we go now Folas?”

“Magical Diction”

“I also have that next.” Adamar comments, “Mind if I sit with you all?”

“Not at all.” Folas replies, I nod in agreement. Briareth soon returns and we all set off to grammar. Folas and Briareth in the lead, Adamar and I behind.

The door is open when we reach it, and on it are three posters. The first one says:

Let's eat, Grandma!

(Or)

Let's eat Grandma!

Punctuation saves lives.

The second one is a lot less dire, just

Pronunciation matters

The third one though? It is serious.

--FireBall--

--FireWind--

--Cone of Fire--

--Fire Cube--

--Sphere of Fire--

--FireBolt--

They each do the same damage, but to different people.

Who will your word choices harm, friend or foe?

How many will you kill by accident?

By each word there is an enchanted picture of one group of fighters facing off against another group, the groups have different shirt colors to tell them apart, the caster is in the middle, and everyone is in the same position each time. But as I take a closer look at the first picture, the one by FireBall, the caster in the center of one group casts the spell. I watch enthralled as it blooms between his palms and then he hurls it at the other team. They dodge out of the way, but still take damage. I go down the list, and each spell has a different effect. Fire cube even centers on the caster, hitting all of his teammates in range, so that he is the only one left unscathed. Fire bolt however, is like a mini FireBall, but only does damage to one of the enemies.

“Wow.” Is all I say.

“Yeah, the detail on these things is fantastic, I keep asking Ms Sharian who drew and animated these for her, but she’s mum on the subject.” Folas replies.

“Why do you call her Ms instead of Master?” I ask curiously.

“Oh, she’s not a Master of her subject. Who can be a Master of punctuation anyways? She’s only a Student Teacher.”

“A what now?”

“A Student Teacher.” Adamar explains. “An older student who gets so good at a subject that they can teach it. You do it if you want to get a teaching job afterwards, but first you need to be a Master’s helper so you can learn the basics. Unfortunately STs only cover the normal classes, they don’t get to teach magic until after they graduate and are hired by one school or another.”

“Why do you know so much about STs Adamar?” Briareth asks. “You want to become one?”

“I was thinking about it.” Adamar says evasively. “Now we should probably get inside so we can grab the extra chairs and lug them over to a table before they are taken.”

“I think we were done here anyways, right Faladel?” says Folas, I nod. We all go inside and drag enough chairs over to one table so that we can all sit together.

“You sure she won’t mind us moving seats around?” I ask Folas and Adamar.

“It’s fine, she is really lenient, unless we get too noisy, then she cracks down hard.” Folas says. “She is really good at keeping the class under control.” We watch as the room begins to fill up. I can’t tell which of the others are students and who is supposed to be the teacher. No one stands out from the group. Because the students can sit wherever they want I see a similar pattern to what happened in the Grand Dining Hall happening here. Some crowd around our table, others take tables across the room. Eventually the bell rings and a girl, blond, bubbly, with bright blue eyes and robes bursts through the doorway panting slightly.

“Can’t be late for my own class.” She comments to the room as a whole. “That would be setting a really bad example.” Then Ms. Sharian, for that is probably who she is, takes in the obvious divide in the classroom. “What is happening here?” No one answers her. “Well, it seems that everyone appears to be taking a side. The question is why?” Everyone stays silent. “Oh come on, seriously?” I don’t say anything, partly because I don’t want to stand out, partly because waiting for someone to break and admit it is really fun. “Well then I’ll have to find out in my own time, which means I will be spying on you all. Blame yourselves.” Ms. Sharian says cooly. Not a pip is heard. Her eyebrows raise. “Okay then, I guess this new seating arrangement shouldn’t prevent us from doing class.”

The rest of class is mainly subdued. Everything goes fine, of course. No one is acting out, but everything seems more dreary somehow. Ms. Sharian tries her best to keep the class alive, randomly calling on students who don’t seem to be interested with questions about what we’ve just covered. But an aura of uncaring covers most students, and under it tension racks up faster than Ms. Sharian can squash it down with normalcy.

When the distracted students inevitably have no clue what she is talking about when she calls on them, they can guess again after failing once, or ‘call on a friend’, basically someone who knows what she is talking about will raise their hand and if they are called upon can give a hint, or they can just give the answer. This works fine, until she changes her question routine.

“Tarron.” She calls. The kid in question on the other side of the room sits up straight, a surprised and slightly scared look on his face. “Should this list have semicolons or commas? However, comma, even though Severus had suggested that they study, comma, Peter and Oliver decided to stay up all night watching the comet shower, sleep in the next day, and wing it on the test, period. You can call on a friend for this one without guessing first. After all there are only two answers to this question, but if you call on a friend or get it wrong you have to tell me why the correct answer is right.”

“Um…” Tarron hesitates, looking to his friends for advice. I see one of them shrug unhelpfully.

I wonder what would happen if I tried to help him out. Would he reject my help because of the divide? I raise my hand. I think I know the answer, and no one else seems to. Tarron sees my hand go up and looks shocked. I smile softly, am I really that surprising? I haven't done anything but offer to help answer a question. Now will he take it or reject it? Does his dislike of me overcome his need for an answer? Ms. Sharian hasn’t seemed to notice my offer of help and turns back to Tarron.

“So, Tarron?” Ms. Sharian says, tapping her foot. Tarron fidgets, glances quickly at me, and then frowns.

“Semi-colons.” He states, trying his best to appear confident.

“Wrong.” Ms. Sharians reply is blunt, but not unkind. “I see that you haven’t been listening. Would you like to phone a friend to help explain?” She glances around. “Was no one listening last class? Does nobody know why a comma goes there instead of semicolons?” Then she sees my patient hand, still raised in the air. “Oh good, one of the new two knows the answer. You want to call on him Tarron?” Tarron frowns, stubborn, but a bit shamefaced. Interesting. He still doesn’t want my help. Ms. Sharian catches on fast to the dilemma in his mind. “Ah, but he is on the other side. That makes things more complicated doesn’t it? You didn’t have this in mind when you offered to help, did you new kid? What is your name anway?”

“The name is Faladel Mithrandir, Ms. Sharian, and I have no clue what you are talking about.” I smile, lying smoothly. She can’t prove that I was doing anything.

“Mithrandir hmm?” I don’t respond. She turns back to Tarron practically grinning. “Well, Tarron? Don’t you want Mr. Mithrandir’s help?” She seems to think this is hilarious. I don’t appreciate her messing with my experiment but I can’t stop her. Ahh well, I suppose it would be kind of funny to someone on the outside. Poor Tarron looks torn, should he take my help, or look like an idiotic, petty, jerk? Before he can decide disaster strikes. Well it is a disaster for me and my results, but a miracle for him. The bell rings and class ends.

As Tarron and the rest of us quickly file out, Tarron as fast as he can without running, Ms Sharian shouts the homework at us.

“Don’t forget to read pages 234 and 235 of your workbook and do practices A and B on semicolons!”