I wake up at the clear chime of morning's first bell. Which should be something around 5AM on Earth.

My neck is frosted with Gel's tears and snot. The room is frozen my breath congealing in the air as my head peaks out of the futon.

Gel is still asleep entangled in the blanket. I carefully leave her side managing to not wake her up and go downstairs to put some water to boil and rekindle the fire in our hearth.

As I make a quick towel wash with the lukewarm water Mom wakes up before 2nd bell and joins me in the kitchen. She is slightly taken aback finding me here this early but doesn't voice any question.

“Gel came to sleep in our room” I say in an informative tone “Cold woke me earlier but she is still asleep.”

She isn't surprised. I guess it was within her expectations: Gel barely knows Jocalie after all.

“Is Gel's mom fine ?” I ask warily.

My mom frowns unsure what she should tell a young child or not.

“As fine as she can be. Danik can be... out of control” she says measuring her words “but he isn't mean inside, mostly.” her frowning brows are at a disagreement with her words. “Dad took him to the fountain for a midnight bath to clear his drunk-ass head”.

I'm quite startled: it's the first time I hear my mom swearing in front of me.

“Ovidee will be fine, except a shiner and some bruises. She stayed with Danor, I don't know if Danik went back home.” She's standing sadly in front of our fire warming her hands up from the cold ambience creeping around her.

Danor is Gel's older brother, he is 8 springs old. I don't envy him for having to deal with the aftermaths of yesterday's events at his place.

Mom let's herself get hypnotized by the dancing flames for a short while before taking at deep breath of warmed air before getting back on track with the daily necessities :

“Since you are awake go fetch some water and prepare the tea, Oreo knows we need something to warm up the mood.”

I grab a small pail and go to the fountain, three houses further away.

It's still night outside, days shrunk as winter crept upon us. The first rays of light are just starting to appear in the east (strangely enough sun here also travels from east to west). The ground is whitened with hoarfrost, trying to take a bite at my toes through the thin clothes strips I wrapped around my feet.

Once back home and a full kettle on the stove, I go wake Gel up and sends her back to my sister, before my brother can wake up. She is still sleepy, eyes puffy from tiredness and having cried her fill yesterday.

The rest of the house wakes up and everyone meets at the table for tea and a slice of bunta with a cup of warmed soup. No one utters a word while eating.

After my Dad empties his plate, he turns towards Gel:

“If it were to happen again just come here. I said the same to your mother. We can't do much, just know our door is always open. May Husnd shield us all.” He makes a sign in the air.

Gel nods and thanks him shyly.

He then leave for work taking Barasti with him. Jocalie leaves to join her own group (I don't envy her, washing anything in this weather will be harsh work).

Mom takes Gel to see her mother before coming back to pick me up and take the both of us to the workshop.

The mood is grim in our room. Melodi and Balout aren't sure why, suspecting we had a fight or something. Day is spent without a hitch, almost like usual : numbers, some maths, light exercise in the sunny afternoon. Ms Tarina came at the end of the day to check on Gel, she didnt say much to her just giving her a hug.

It's really pissing me off. I know I'm not expected to do something, but just being impotent, not being able to do a single thing even if I want to help her is tearing me from the inside out. I hate being trapped in the body of a child, having to act like one for now.

When we get back home and I wave at Gel, I can see the fear lurking in the corner of her purple eyes. She fears the same thing will happen again and so do I. And I can only clench my fists in frustration at my own powerlessness.

Luckily nothing happens for the days to follow. When I ask Gel about her parents she just tells me her Dad is drinking less these days and that her mother is fine. Far from ideal, but probably the best we can hope for.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Weeks pass by and we are now in the heart of winter. There is some unmelted snow accumulating in the streets. A surprises awaits us at the workshop: in Ms Tarina's office there is a small bronze skinned man. He must be in his thirties, his head is shaved bald except for a long braid flowing down from the top of his neck. His black almond shaped eyes are full of sagacity as he is peering at us.

Ms Tarina introduces him “This is Murshid. He is one of Typhoon Taonga's servants and has been sent here as a... gift” There is a large leather collar around his neck making me suspect the man is more a slave than a servant. Slavery is tolerated in our kingdom, yet unusual. It is looked upon as barbarous and is mostly for foreigners.

The man bows at us, hands cupped, looking down at his feet.

“Please raise your head” our schoolmistress says “they are just commoners kids you are embarrassing them and me too, no need to be so polite.” she waves at him.

“Murshid has been sent as thanks for Mr Taonga's recently newfound... vigor” She smiles like a fox and looks at Gel. “He'll stay with us for a week and is to share his to tutor you. The Typhoon was impressed by how well learned you all are and wants to help further your potentials. Do not bully him, and you Murshid do not spoil them too much. I'll bear responsibility.” she leaves this last sentence to the free interpretation of both sides.

“Thank you mistress.” he says in a nosy voice, slightly bowing again. He has a lighter accent than his owner but his tone is still singing about far away lands.

Our usual mentor leaves us with our new on lease one.

He gestures for us to sit down before taking a sit himself. His thin lips stretch in an uneasy smile. His tongue nervously wetting his lips. He clearly is unsure about how to act around us: Ms Tarina gave him a white check but his master must have told him to treat us with care. He can't handle the contradiction and is at a stalemate.

I brake the standstill by asking him “What can you teach us Murshid ?”

“Many things young master, I can teach you arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, geography, history of the old and new empire and of the south kingdoms, botanic, a bit of alchemy, classic and modern Tangana or Ururuan common tongue.” He lists with pride and swiftness back in his comfort zone.

The girls giggles probably lost by his listing full of awkwards words and amused by the “young master”. Balout is straight up laughing to my face...

“No need for young masters or mistresses.” I point at each of us clockwise “I am Telerios, you can just call me Tel, this fat lump of stupidity is Balout” I gently kick my still mocking comrade “The charming kitten here is Melodi” she hisses at me, meaning : I am no kitten! “and this is Gelcaria but I'm sure your master have already told you about her.” He lightly nods at each of us not denying my last affirmation.

“We will call you teacher if it is fine with you ?” I propose.

“Of course young mas... young Tel” The man has been through some strict training.

“We will need to start with basics, we aren't blade's children so forget about the fancy study subjects. But maybe you can teach us to write and read.” I try to hide my eagerness but finally I get the occasion I waited for so long: more than 3 years without reading a line, I miss reading so much.

The man is taken a bit aback, I'm surprised he expected to teach alchemy or astronomy to a bunch of shielded 3 years something old commoners. I doubt even children of the noblesse would be able to go for such advanced topics. Are the child of Nobles so precocious or is the man just not used to deal with students that young ?

He quickly takes in my demand. “Forgive me for wrongly presuming about your situation. I am not used to interact with children of commoners, with all due respect” He bows to each of us, this is going to get old real quick. “I can of course share with you my knowledge of modern Tangana scriptures.”

“Is this the writing used around here ?” I ask with interest.

His brows rise in surprise reaching the top of his bald head. He quickly controls his facial composure but i manage to catch a hint of fear, I imagine such disrespectful faux pas would earn him some sort of punishment in his usual context.

“ Yes young Telerios, again pardon me for overstepping my boundaries.” He keeps his head down.

“No worries, no offence taken. Instead, let's stop with the bowing for now. Take it as an order if you need to.” I can see him flustered, but he knows how to take orders and adapts quickly.

“Then where should I start ?”

The man is clearly a well learned scholar, but not that good a teacher. He lacks the authority to keep the attention of Balout and Mel and despite his foreign accent his tone is too monotonous. I can see Gel's eyes wander astray sometimes.

The bad news is that writing is going to be a pain in the ass to learn.

They use a mixed system: halfway between hieroglyphs and half ideograms. Only a few of them are to make basic sounds mostly for foreign words. Otherwise it is only ideograms. Meaning every single word is its own drawing.

No alphabet, no phonetics.

If you come across a word you don't know: you need to find someone that does. If you want to write a word you don't know: same punishment...

this is so unpracticable.

Even our own names are going to be their own ideograms. And I say going to be because we wont have a written name before naming day.

This is just hell. The torment of Tantalus custom-tailor made for me: the gods are putting writing in my reach while making it unreachable the minute after.

After digesting the news I make him use the sand slates to show us how to write some basic words: water, fire earth, wind, bunta, city, flower, sun, man, woman etc... The ideograms are far too complexes. So many strokes, turns, point, with the sightliest difference making it into another word.

Just learning five words took us the day.

Murshid seems pleased with our progresses but I am not. If he is to stay for just a week that means I'll learn about 35 words only, supposing I don't forget a single one.

I understand why there are no books laying around or no written signs outside. No one has the time to learn this unpracticable system thus only a few specialized workers (temple priests, scribes, scholars and blades) have the luxury to learn to read and write.

On tea break (a fragrant thyme like tea) I probe him about other writing techniques. Old Tangana is like cuneiform: ideograms but with basic lines, very primitive, very few words. Ururuan is also ideograms but with far more circles, loops and curves. I'm amazed they manage to write books with this: I can only imagine scribes wasting pages when their sleeves will smother fresh ink all over...

Only the beastkin tongue has something approaching alphabet. Using a hexhex (256) signs corresponding to sounds so they can write phonetically. He heard of it and knows the elves of the southern archipelagos use this system too but he never saw any scriptures of it.

To change my mind from these depressing news I ask him a few questions about astronomy. There isn't much to say: the moons are uncannily regular and they just mapped the stars, mostly for navigation purposes but don't have the faintest idea of what moons and stars truly are.

According to him, the equivalent of our milky way (called the jewel road) is the remnant of a competition between Oreo and Arteus to decide who had the best gifts for their paramour. It was a stalemate as both goddesses target of their affection got annoyed, fearing the stars would end up outshining their moons. The story still made Melodi and Gelcaria's eyes shine with envy. Balout got almost asleep from our story time.

The day ends on this story as Mom comes to take us back home. We wave goodbye to our new tutor.

On our way home Gel tries to lift my mood up seeing that I am at a let down after today's lesson. I smile at her naïve attempts, more to put her mind at rest as I believe she has enough on her own plate without worrying about me than because I feel comforted. Although it does always feel nice to have someone care about you.

Dinner is a leafy soup with some coddled grey eggs. They are “fish” eggs but everyone is evasive about what kind of fish. So I suspect it's more some kind of moray eel or sea slug eggs. They taste fine nonetheless, like if you just put some nori in your eggs.

After dinner as Jocalie is brushing my hair, Gel knocks at our door again. This time she isn't crying although I can see fear flashing through her lilac eyes.

Dad goes to simmer Danik down. Gel stays to sleep with Joc.

Later that night she silently comes, I can only make out her purple eyes blinking in the darkness of the room as if they had their own inner light.

I was expecting her and before second night bell (midnight) she is fast asleep beside me. Her breath is calm yet her brows are more furrowed than what they should be on any child.