Wolf told Rand to go through the scrolls he‘d given him. In the meantime the boy prepared a Compulsion spell to cast. Wolf was done with his part in no time, but Rand took a good long while to go through the scrolls.

With every passing minute Wolf felt edgy over being late for the food exchange. Luckily, he’d learned not to make promises easily. Mages had to learn to do that, True-Namers even more so. The more powerful you got, the more binding your words became.

It was a strange thing, and Archibald couldn’t properly explain it. Apparently it had to do with the intertwined nature of thoughts, words and the laws of the world.

Once Rand was finally done reading he began explaining to Wolf what’d actually happened. Wolf was shocked to find out that Anna’s father had sent men to kill him just for speaking with her for a while. When Wolf said that the man had gone overboard Rand explained some things about Edwin Didot’s character.

After listening to the short account of the man’s misdeeds Wolf’s first thought was that he should kill that scum. But there was Anna to consider, and coincidentally Wolf had walked out of the whole affair with a slow, but reliable henchman.

In consideration of these things Wolf decided to put off Edwin’s death sentence for now. Not to mention that in order for him to carry it out, he’d have to go to the Nobles’ district, which was a real pain right now.

Wolf gave Rand ten gold coins, which they’d agreed would be his annual pay. Then he explained to him how to find Oakwood Freeland, and gave the man his first mission. To train himself, and whenever he had some spare time, to train the people that lived in the tiny settlement. Once Rand believed Oakwood Freeland was able to fend off bandits without losses he should notify Wolf via the Cornucopia’s caravan. Then Wolf could send more food, clothes, tools and weapons.

Days quietly went by, slowly turning into weeks, and soon enough another month had passed. Wolf was busy preparing lunch for South and himself. South was chopping vegetables and merrily blathering when suddenly Wolf heard a familiar voice behind his back.

“Hey Wolf! And you… The other… person… ” the sweet voice said the word ‘person’ with great hesitation, as if it was an undeserved compliment.

“Anna!” Wolf cried out in surprise. “What are you doing here? Aren’t you locked up in your mansion? Did you run away again?”

The boy turned around after removing the sizzling frying pan from the heater. Anna stood there in clean lady-like clothes, with a grumpy expression of someone who was happy just a moment ago, then got slapped in the face.

“You are rude! What do you take me for?” she exclaimed. “Shouldn’t you be saying that you’re glad to see me after so long?”

South was about to say something, but Anna threatened him with a finger. “If you say anything related to whores, brothels or anything about prostitution in general I’ll take your wineskin and toss it into the river!”

South promptly closed his mouth. After a moment he smiled lecherously, but still chose to remain silent. He probably wanted to say something along the lines of the woman expanding her influence, and ordering the brother-in-law around...

Despite her aggressive entrance Wolf smiled brightly. “I’m really glad to see you. Come, sit down, you can have my serving!”

“Hmph! Who wants your serving!?” she said as she threw a bag of ingredients to Wolf. “Here, there should be enough food there to make lunch for all three of us.”

“You aren’t going to get into trouble?” Wolf looked at her worriedly. “I heard some things about your father...”

Anna shook her head. “I’ve made a deal with my father. If I study diligently, and get the approval from my tutor, I get to have one free day every month. Then I can go wherever I want, and do whatever I want. But I have to have those guys follow me.” she said then pointed behind herself with her thumb.

At the mouth of the alley Wolf could see three heavily armed men. “I don’t want to cook for them,” Wolf said without skipping a beat.

He could feel hostile intent from at least two of them, probably all three. It’s just that the third one didn’t really care, either that, or he hated everyone equally.

“They aren’t that bad,” Anna spoke up for her bodyguards. “They are just doing their job. They are much more confident and competent than the bodyguards I used to have. Father said he fired them after I ran away last time. I kind of feel bad about them. Finding a job seems to be really hard.”

It’s hard for unskilled little girls. Not so much for grown, able bodied men. Besides, one of them is dead, while the other should be doing fine. But I’d better keep my mouth shut about that. “How have you been? What’s new?” Wolf changed the subject masterfully.

“Nothing much. I’ve been spending most of my time studying. Tutor said that I should soon be able to cast spells of the Second Order and that I’m a genius!” South was about to open his mouth and was half way to saying his first word, but Anna just pointed her finger at him, and the drunkard immediately closed his mouth again and grinned. He seemed to be enjoying this kind of treatment.

“Not a word from you!” Anna said for good measure, then turned towards Wolf. “And you, you should feel honored. I decided to use my one day of freedom to come over and have lunch with you.”

Wolf looked at her oddly and cocked his head to the side a bit.

“Your chef back home sucks, doesn’t he?” Wolf said flatly, forcing himself not to smile.

Anna froze for a moment then started giggling.

“He can’t cook a decent meal even after I threatened him and told him that a ten-year-old can cook better than him,” Anna said with an oops I’m busted face.

“And how’s your nanny?” Wolf finally asked the question he wanted to ask. Rand had told him that the woman was killed without going into details.

“Father said he fired her,” Anna replied, then, after a moment of hesitation she continued, “but I heard the servants say that she was… tortured by the guards and then fed to the family dogs. Mother also got a beating, but I don’t want to talk about that now.”

This was obviously a sore point of Anna’s. Quite a few people had suffered because of her little adventure and she felt guilty.

“I apologize for asking... Um, come and sit down. Big brother, it seems that there are more ingredients for you to chop.”

“I guess the stuff she brought is kind of all right.” South said with some hesitation. “Fine, fine. Women, they only bring trouble. That’s why you should avoid them. If you need to…”

“Don’t you dare say it!” Anna growled.

“I apparently forgot what I wanted to say, haha…” South continued without skipping a beat. “So much malice in such a small package,” South said to a potato before chopping it.

South sliced and diced, Wolf cooked and Anna chatted. Then the three of them enjoyed their meal together. As Anna finished cleaning up her bowl with a piece of bread tears started welling up in her eyes.

“Why can’t our stinking chef cook like this? This food is perfect.” Then she turned towards Wolf looking despondent. “Hey Wolf, have you ever considered being my personal chef?”

Wolf turned towards her and flatly gave a “No”.

“Well, could you at least consider it? Pleeeease?” she asked with a twinkle in her eye.

“I can,” Wolf said and went silent for a moment. “Nope, not gonna happen. If you want to eat my cooking you have to come here on Sundays. It’s a bother to cook every day. I wouldn’t have any time for my studies.”

Anna frowned at the cheeky response.

“And what are you studying?” she asked. “Cooking?”

Wolf was about to bark an answer to miss smartypants, but stopped himself at the last moment and shrugged his shoulders.

“Who knows,” he said indifferently.

However, Anna didn’t want to let it go. “Are you one of those kids that dream of entering the Mage Academy and having a good life? If you come to my place and cook for me, I’ll personally teach you magic! But even then I suggest you stop dreaming!”

“Oh and why is that?” Wolf asked with genuine curiosity.

“My tutor said that times have changed,” Anna said proudly. It was now her time to explain things to Wolf! “Before the nobles didn’t care about peasants entering their academy. But now they feel much more threatened by the common born Mages, especially Sorcerers. You might not know this, but there are different kinds of Mages. And Sorcerers are the noblest among all Mages. That is because they are descendants of powerful Mages called True-Namers. They have an incredible innate talent for magic, and they don’t have to study at all! How great is that?”

“Um, that sounds great…” Father used to say that Sorcerers were the most crippled of all Mages. They couldn’t even choose which spells they knew. They inherited all of their abilities from their ancestors. To make things worse, the abilities they got were random, which is to say based on luck. And if you gave in to the temptation and took the path of Sorcery instead of fighting it, then no matter how hard you worked, you’d never be able to surpass your ancestor. The further removed you are from the True-Namer ancestor, the lower your maximum potential. No Mage with any kind of ambition would trade places with a Sorcerer…

It was kind of lucky that Dad’s injury destroyed the inheritance transfer… Wolf thought bitterly, but the topic Anna brought up interested him a great deal.

“So, what are the nobles doing with the common born Mages?” he asked, while trying to appear like he wasn’t interested and like he was just going along with the flow. It was paramount for Wolf to keep a low profile, for that was his father’s wish.

“Tutor said that they get bullied,” Anna said, recalling what her tutor had mentioned. “Students that have family among the teaching staff arrange things for commoners they find an eyesore. For instance talented commoners get sent on dangerous missions. The kind of missions people don’t return from.”

“What about the headmaster?” Wolf couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“Headmaster of Silverhound Mage Academy is silent about this treatment. Apparently even the headmaster is tacitly approving this kind of behavior.” Anna replied immediately.

“Really? And the commoner students are just taking that without fighting back?” Wolf was surprised by this.

Mages were supposed to be intelligent people, so how could they take this lying down?

“I don’t know much about that. I’ll let you know in a year or so. Once I enter the Mage Academy I’ll have firsthand information.” Anna smiled proudly when she said this.

Apparently she was a shoe-in for the Mage Academy, and planned to enter as soon as she was old enough to attend.

“Won’t you have trouble? Your family is just the lowest rank of nobility,” Wolf asked fearing something might happen to Anna.

“I’ll be fine. Barons are still nobility. Besides, I’m a pretty girl to boot! Who’d dare bully me?” She answered smugly before a look of confusion appeared on her face. “How did you know that Father is a Baron?”

“Oh, that…” Wolf struggled for a moment, then came up with an excuse. “I think I heard those two bodyguards of yours mention it the last time I saw them.”

Wolf improvised to say something sensible. The fact that it was the truth was just an unexpected bonus.

“Did they? I really can’t remember them mentioning anything about my family…” But Anna brushed the issue aside. “Anyway a Baron is a genuine noble. In fact the majority of the noble households are at the level of Barons. And Barons are above many Thanes and Knight level estates. Besides, mother’s family had joined the ranks of nobility centuries ago. You might not know this, but every noble household has about ten lower ranked noble households under them that act as retainers and stewards.

“The times have greatly changed though. My tutors taught me that all nobles used to live in a major town or city that acted as the administrative center of their territory. Their job was to manage their retainers, gather the taxes and pay the tithe to those above them.” Anna failed to hide the fact that she was very proud of using these difficult words in a proper way. “They also said that nobles used to meet in the city of their liege annually to discuss important matters, redistribute land and see who did what. However, because of the unrest and danger, all nobles had moved to Silver City. Meanwhile they have their trusted aides to hold the fort back home.

“My family is one of the ones that are better off, despite my grandfather and the rest of his family dying. I heard that father greatly revitalized the family, and earned a bunch of money by lending it to people and then charging interest. Also, when the trouble began he was very farsighted. He’d bought a lot of livestock and hired the most competent farmers he could find. Then he took the land in the Nobles’ district from those that couldn’t pay back their debts and turned it into farmland. Now we are producing food for the entire Noble’s district! Even the beef and vegetables we just ate were a Didot family product. Father has even higher aspirations, but it’s unlikely that we’ll get the chance to rise to the rank of Viscount any time soon.”

Wolf and Anna kept on chatting for a while longer, while South snored, forced into sleep by wine and the boring story about noble status, holds and such. Unfortunately, time passed too quickly and soon enough it was time for Anna to go back home.