Next class was History. Tenthé was looking forward to it.

Leo and his crew ignored him as he passed them in the hall. Tenthé wasn’t fooled; he was familiar with gang mentality. Leo would try to get even, sooner rather than later.

Reaching the classroom, Tenthé claimed his usual seat. The students were jittery and quieted when the Magister entered. Wasting no time, she dove into telling everyone about their parentage. Once again, there were screams and tears, although in one case two boys shook hands, having learned they were half-brothers.

Tenthé found it hard to relate. In the Mission District, kids didn’t always know, or even want to know, their parents. Often, the gangs were their family. Other families were like the Lady’s, a mom with no sign of the father. Or in her case, fathers.

“Master Tenthé,” Magister Baeuerin began. “You’re a bit of an anomaly. We managed to turn up an old man in the South Side who remembered having a kid that might have been you. Elishua, whom you know, was sent to talk to him, but his answers were difficult to follow. Because of that, she took some of his blood for us to analyze.”

Tenthé knew what living in the South Side meant. Any grown-up found there would be a major wastoid. The guy’d probably spend all his time talking to things even Tenthé couldn’t see.

Magister Baeuerin continued. “The analysis of the blood showed he’s a lot like you, but many of our findings don’t make sense. You are related, but the matches are all over the place. It’s not anything I’ve ever seen before. I consulted with others, and we argued over the interpretation. My belief is that the guy is your dad or an uncle, but one or both of you have been exposed to so much magic that something had been modified in your fundamental basis, which makes our results so strange.

“Mind you, this is just a theory. Talk to Elishua. She has more for you.”

With that, the Magister turned to the next person.

Tenthé wasn’t sure how he felt. Many of the kids he knew didn’t want anything to do with their dads. He poked at his feelings, finding a decided lack of desire to look up the old druggie. He’d wait and see what Elishua had to say.

After class, he and his friends met up to eat. As they went through the buffet, everybody stole as much food as they could, stocking up for the corridor war they were about to host. Hungry business, that. When lunch was done, Tenthé steered himself toward Mystic Studies.

Magister Grenville was strange. Outside the College, her magic would be called Wild Magic and was used by only the craziest of crazies. But she wasn’t anything like that. If he had to, he would say that she was the best of anyone he’d met here. Somehow, she’d managed to get around all of his magical defenses, just passing through them as if they didn’t exist.

Well, to be proper, his magical abilities should probably be called his Physics abilities, since they were tried and true with no unexpected results… mostly. He knew he was strong. Heck, he’d gone up against gods and won, but Magister Grenville’s magic made it look like he using shield and sword made of parchment.

What if he had to fight someone like her? It might not go so well. He had to attend her classes, if only to find some way to beat her. On top of that, maybe he could learn Wild Magic too! Tenthé didn’t know how, but he felt that if anyone could teach it to him, it would be Magister Grenville.

Tenthé walked into the classroom and stopped. He found himself floating in a star-filled vista that looked the same as where he and the Guard had hung out. What was going on?

Part of the starscape moved and resolved into a silhouette of the Guard, still far away, and not looking toward him. Tenthé peered closer. The Guard was gesturing, and if he really strained, he could see two other figures. One was Turtle, and the other wasn’t easy to make out, being covered in mists. Even so, he was sure it was the mystery god he’d been running into around the College.

Tenthé, being himself, decided to wander over and find out what was going on. This turned out to be easier to think of than do. He tried flailing his arms and legs and pushing with his magic, but that just started him spinning. He then attempted various spells and techniques, but again, not much happened. Except he began spinning even faster. When he started to get nauseous, he quit trying anything magical.

He had noticed that when he extended his arms, he spun slower; so he took out a big sword and a staff and held them straight out to each side. This slowed him enough that he could see the Guard but as best he could tell, the others had already left.

At that moment, the stars faded out, and the classroom materialized around him. The room appeared first, then desks, and finally the students. They were all staring at the front where Magister Grenville was laughing so hard she had to lean on the lectern while tears streamed down her cheeks.

Tenthé could guess why. He had to admit, his feeble attempt to move had been kind of funny. After everything he’d been through, Tenthé had no shame when he gave something an honest try and failed miserably. These things happened.

He put the sword and staff away and found his seat.

The Magister recovered, wiped her face, then started the lecture.

“Today, I…” she began giggling again, then rallied. “I…” She stopped and took a breath, then continued. “Today, I’m going to teach you a little spell called Mary’s Paradox. It is a simple thing, but it’s pure Magic… Wild Magic, if you will. It gives you a feeling that a specific result is going to be achieved, but then something completely unexpected happens.

“I give you fair warning! Although I have used this spell many times, and the results have always been minor, it is pure Magic. There is no guarantee.

“To that end, I’ve enabled the highest level of containment, and, if I detect any hint of an issue, the classroom will be locked down. Here’s the spell.”

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She showed everyone the simple gestures and then described the mental image that needed to be used.

The class knew to practice the gestures and thoughts separately before casting. Tenthé went through the motions, then checked the mental component. He noticed something very odd, though. When he imagined gazing at the spell with his green eye, he could see that hidden in the structure was an infinitesimally small hole to somewhere. On the other hand, his brown one showed a raging stream flowing out of the hole that would tear reality to shreds! If the hole enlarged, or the right kind of chaos came through, then who knows what would happen? It would be really bad!

Tenthé pushed his glyph.

“Yes?” the Magister asked.

“Um, Ma’am, I wouldn’t cast that spell, ever.”

Instead of arguing, the Magister turned to the class. “All right, everyone. Who took the time to examine the spell I gave you?”

A few glyphs lit, but most stayed dark. Magister Grenville pointed to one of the students who had pushed their glyph.

“Master Linton, what did you find?”

“Um, there is a weird spot in the spell. I couldn’t tell what it was. It felt bad, but I figured you knew what you were doing.”

“Why didn’t you ask me about it?”

“Well, like I said, I trusted you.”

“Didn’t I warn you about the dangers?”

“Yeah, but…”

“Let me give you a little more information. This spell was the last one cast by the Duke of Twilling Gate.”

Gasps filled the room. Twilling Gate was a place of Wild Magic. It wasn’t a fanciful garden with fairies and flowers, instead, it was a place where, if you were lucky, you would die quickly. If not, well… there were stories.

In a sudden flurry, everyone purged their system. Purging was one of the first lessons; a way to remove a dangerous spell to ensure you couldn’t cast it inadvertently.

On the other hand, Tenthé examined the spell very carefully. He was sure he could strip it down to its simplest form; a tiny hole that shot a stream of chaos. It was interesting, so he tucked it away to check out later.

The Magister was watching him, so he stared back. After a moment, she turned to the class.

“So, does anyone want to guess why I set you up to die horribly? Or, at least, possibly.”

Tenthé pushed his glyph.

“Yes, Tenthé?”

“Because you’re evil.”

“Well, of course!” she answered, then scanned the class. “Any other theories?”

She looked at a student. “You.”

The girl stood. “I think you wanted to underline that we are responsible for our own decisions. Never automatically trust what anyone says. Take the time to verify.”

The Magister agreed, “Close enough. Wild Magic exists in forms other than spells. It may be called for, depending on the situation. There are ways to use it, methods that don’t involve casting. For example, I’ve mentioned Oracles. They open a part of themselves up to Wild Magic and observe, then record their findings.

“Some of you will may think I am being fairly lax with my syntax, here. As you have learned, amongst us Magisters, we use ‘Physics’ for repeatable magic, and ‘Magic’ for what is commonly known as Wild Magic. As you can guess, this causes confusion when you have a varied group. For this beginners class, to avoid any misunderstandings, I’ll use the term ‘Wild Magic’ instead of ‘Magic’. In your senior years, be sure to use the correct terminology with whoever you are conversing. You will be soundly chastised if you refer to anything as ‘Wild Magic’.

“As to how we can use it; this is where statistics comes into play. The observer records their observations over time, and looks for trends. That is, characteristics that repeat. It is also possible to reduce the investigation time by having multiple individuals do the same thing. Either way, you should always establish a statistical model.

“The next few classes I will introduce you to the field of statistics and how we might apply it to Magic.

Without Bear, Tenthé had no idea what the Magister said after that; it was all numbers and stuff. And, as was becoming normal, he was asked to remain behind.

“Tenthé, I know you have issues with math, but I would like you to continue taking my class. What I am teaching is a very basic level of magic; there are some things you will never understand, but in others, you are far beyond what anyone here will ever be able to do. The vision you experienced when you entered the room is one such example.”

“I don’t get what you mean.”

“What you need… uh, it isn’t training; you have a lot of that already. You have to develop a… feel. Even though you can already walk paths that no Magister here, even me, can follow, I intend to help you improve so you can do even more.

“The one thing you lack is schooling in the fundamentals. This is precisely what I am presenting in these classes. It’s like you have built a tower, but only made a weak base for it. You had your vision today, which I watched over your shoulder, so to speak. In that, you had little to no control.”

“But, isn’t Wild Magic supposed to be, I don’t know… anything? You can’t control it?” he asked.

“Not exactly. Something that appears random could have rules; all we have to do is figure out what they are. Each time you cast a Magic spell you might get completely different results, but that doesn’t imply that the results don’t follow a pattern.”

“So, are you saying that in my vision, if I kept trying stuff, I might have been able to do move?”

“Possibly. A lot of what you saw was for you alone. I could only see you and some stars. Sorry I laughed. The use of the sword and staff was pretty smart. That’s what I meant when I said you should experiment and discover if what you are experiencing has rules or patterns.”

“Aren’t I going to have problems here since I can’t count?”

“Well, if one path doesn’t work for you, do you give up and go home?”

“Um, sometimes.”

“Precisely! Now be off with you! I have other things to do.”

As Tenthé walked toward his dorm, he thought about Magister Grenville’s class. He concluded it was weird.

He greeted a few mates as he passed, then continued on to his room, where he could see how Bear’s recovery was going. When he climbed up to the attic, he found the toy rocking in the chair. He’d wrapped himself in a blanket and had improved from unconscious to wretched. Evidence was that he had thrown up at least a few times.

“Hey Bear! How can you puke? Your insides are all fluff.”

“Don’t talk to me!”

“Uh-huh. Was it worth it?”

Bear forgot to be sick. “Yeah, definitely! Did you know that the wait staff gets naked when they change? We had a good time, if you get what I mean!”

Life in the Mission District had been quite raw; Tenthé had few illusions about how things worked, but even so, whatever Bear was hinting at was difficult to imagine.

“I guess,” he responded. “That much puke doesn’t lie.”

“Yeah! Now le’me sleep,” Bear mumbled as he pulled the blanket around himself and started snoring.

Tenthé used a little magic, or rather, Physics, to clean up, then went down to the lounge.

The boys were gearing up for the battles tomorrow. Their idea had caught on and almost all the students were going to participate. Shockingly, someone even had the forethought to clear their plans with the College. They’d said it was okay, since the game was harmless and the Guardians would suppress any flare-ups, just in case.

In spite of everything that would probably go wrong, Tenthé could hardly wait.