“As I was saying, I think we should skip the rest of the examinations”

The headmaster looked around the room, first to Ota, then Dys, then Anu.

Finally, he stared at Kay, still perched atop Anu.

“Don’t worry, you’ve passed. Anu? was it.”

Anu breathed out, melting into the chair.

“You two, thank you for bringing this to my attention. I’m sure you’re both very busy”

Ota interrupted: “I’m not”

“so if you could give me a moment, both of you”, he continued, ignoring Ota.

Ota grumbled under her breath, meanwhile Dys had been smirking since the accident.

The pair left, leaving Anu and the Headmaster alone.

“Perfect, so Anu, what the hell is going on, and Kay? I think you owe me an explanation too”

Kay dug into Anu’s hair, ignoring him.

“Here we have a self-declared smith, with no magic or swordplay, who frustrated our swordplay teacher and destroyed our mana testing equipment. Dys says you should pass, Ota wants to fight you again. ”

“I’m sorry”

“Don’t be. It was their job to stop things going wrong. Now they have gone, could you tell me in your own words, what happened”

Anu started to recount the exam but was quickly dismissed.

“No. I want to know how you ended up contracting with Kay here. Or the other way around.”

“Uh”, Anu froze in place.

“One: They both saw Kay change in size. That takes quite a lot of mana. Two: you claim to have no mana, and yet tested quite positively. Three: Contracts don’t tend to work that way.”

He paused. ”Anu, what’s going on here? or should I be asking your friend there”

Anu took a deep breath. She started from the beginning.

“I found out a contracted beast would let me apply, and went to the hive nearby ... ”

“... They weren’t tame, but the hive had been docile and friendly to us in the village as long as anyone could remember ...”

“... My circuit failed, but, when I pulled out a backup, well, Kay offered me a contract...”

“... they changed size to get on the boat ...” “... and then, that’s when it exploded”

“Right”, the headmaster was starting to make sense of things.

“Do you know how contracts work, Anu?”

“You offer them mana, they reciprocate in terms of action”

“Yep. So, it sounds Kay here has been offering you quite a lot of mana, more than you realise. Speaking of which, Kay has been very quiet.”

“Kay?” tap “Would you mind, joining us?”, asked Anu.

A grumpy yes was tapped out. The headmaster cleared his desk, offering it to Anu.

Anu went to lift Kay over, only to watch them leap onto the table.

“Hello Kay, I’m ..”

Kay waggled at him. Anu translated “Yep, they know”

Briefly asking himself ‘what am I doing’, the headmaster spoke again.

“Kay, Anu said that you’re a mana-weaver, is that correct?”

tap “That’s correct”, Anu added, “Although Kay is saying ‘not how you said mana weaver’” tap

“Wait, Kay you’re not a weaver?” tap tap “You are weaver” tap “but a particular type” tap

Anu felt she had become quite proficient in decoding Kay’s body language.

The headmaster found the interaction between the two a little amusing, if only following half of the conversation.

“A different sort of mana weaver? Would you mind if I took a closer look?”

tap. Short and loud. “I think Kay is saying ‘not too close’” tap

He slowly leaned over, carefully looking at the pattern on Kay’s thorax, noting the gold lining around the joints of their exoskeleton.

“Um”. The headmaster pulled a face to say ‘That’s not right’, and without further explanation, he walked over to a nearby bookcase, searching for something.

“No. Nope”, he haphazardly stacked the unwanted book on a pile. Anu watched as the stack grew more unwieldly as he ploughed through his bookshelf.

“No. Wait”, the right book had been found.

He quickly returned to the desk, skipping through pages as he walked, book in hand.

He looked at he book, then at Kay, and at the book again.

“Kay, um, is this you? Well, are you like this?”

He spun the book around, showing the open page to Kay.

tap tap tap tap tap

“Um, they’re saying yes, but”

“Of course, here you go”, he handed the book to Anu, “this explains so much”

She saw the words ‘Sovereign Mana Weaver’

Anu re-read the scant description, while Kay was still tapping away in delight.

“Mana Weavers form a hive, with some social structure. There are Soldiers, Workers, and occasionally, Commanders and/or Queens (depending on egg cycle). Nests can span hundreds of miles with interconnected smaller units, operating semi independently”

Underneath was a chart, with the various small drones, a child’s silhouette for scale, the larger worker drones and variant of queens, next to an adult. Finally there was a large spider, twice the size of an adult, with ‘Sovereign’ underneath.

A footnote explained that ‘Various historical reports have talked of a titanic mana weaver, with golden lines, and thick black exoskeleton. We include this for completeness, but the reader is encouraged to explore ....’

Anu shut the book. She felt it didn’t explain anything at all.

“Kay?”, Anu asked for their attention

“You’re a Sovereign”. tap. It sounded quite smug to Anu.

“Wait, you’re not you’re normal size” of course

“No I meant back in the hall” well, yes

“When you met me, you’d already shrunk?” , Kay tapped out yes, duh

“How big do you get? As big as the picture? Wait, bigger? Kay?”

Anu’s confusion was interrupted by the Headmaster.

“Excuse me for interrupting here, but to confirm: Kay you set up a contract with Anu?”

tap “That’s a yes, isn’t it Anu” “Yep”

“Right”, he returned to his seat, now face to face with Anu, and Kay still perched on the desk.

“I need to explain a few things”, he began counting off a list

“One: To be clear, you are being accepted into the Academy”

“Two: You won’t be joining the beast corp. Technically, if you did, it would be Kay joining.”

Anu was a little too delighted, and burst out into celebration, “YESSS!”

He coughed.

“Three: You’re going to have to study in the Magicians school. Someone with enough mana to blow up a room is exactly the sort of person who needs to study magic.”

“Four: Keep your weird contract quiet for now, well, don’t go telling everyone about Kay, but your teachers will have to know”

“Five: You’ve qualified for the emperors’...”

The conversation was interrupted by the door slamming open, and a handful of threats.

“Orland. What the hell is going on here? And where is, Oh. Hi Anu”

“Hi Agwa”, Anu replied.

“As I was saying, wait, you know each other? Whatever, just sit down Agwa.”

Kay took the interruption as their chance to return to Anu, and was now making a comfortable mess of her hair. Again.

As Agwa sat down, the door slammed open again.

“Headmaster. If you think I am going to let another of my smiths play intern for your pointless plant... oh”

“Hello Adam”, Anu waved.

The headmaster, Orland, put his head in his hand, pausing for a moment.

Agwa just scowled at the new guest.

When she had complained about smiths getting in her way, she meant Adam. There was some budgetary fights within the city, and academy as a whole, but mostly he had dismissed her work as pointless, and she had been determined to prove him wrong.

She’d also been a little petty, and maybe the paperwork he’d been subjected to for months on end might have been a little over the top.

The headmaster sighed, wondering exactly how Anu had managed to get entangled between the two. It wasn’t worth it.

“Does anyone else want to storm in? Dys? Ota? are either of you still outside?”

Ota peeked through the doorway, “He’s gone but...”

“Just come inside. Assuming there’s no-one else? Good? Right. One at a time. Agwa, you first, then, Adam.”

Agwa had arrived after finding out about the accident. She’d put in a request for a smithing student to intern, specifically Anu, to steal her before another teacher could ask.

Adam had arrived for a totally unrelated reason, but had discovered Agwa’s request and stormed into the headmasters office in anger.

Ota explained she was just very curious about how Anu had dodged her attacks, and with nothing better to do, she stuck around to ask questions later.

Orland started again.

“Anu is joining us. She’s joining the Smiths, and as a student, Agwa is allowed to make a request”, he nodded at her, “but as a guild member Anu can select her own work”, pointing to Adam, “and we will be paying the guild rate, of course”.

Adam nodded, satisfied.

“Ota, tell Dys that Anu needs magic lessons, mostly sensing, control, manipulation”, He paused. “and tell him to stick to barriers for now”

“...and Ota, despite your request, Anu won’t be joining the beast corp”

“Why?”

“It isn’t safe for the beast corp, Ota. Kay’s a titan class”

“What?”

Ota’s eyes bugged out. Hesitantly, she looked over at Anu.

The day replayed in her mind. The tiny spider on Anu’s head could have easily crushed her.

Ota lunged back slightly when Kay waved at her.

“Ota? ... Ota?” “Yes”

“and Ota, per your request, although you will tutor her in combat training, the goal is to understand how the contract is affecting her physically. Finally, Anu, due to your unique situation, You’ll be getting a scholarship”

“What!”, Anu exclaimed.

“There’s a scholarship set aside for any student who shows exceptional ability. You are the only one who destroyed our equipment”, Orland smiled, “That and you’re the only person on record, to contract with a Sovereign Weaver”

Ota snapped out of her earlier shock, “The emperor’s scholarship?”

“Yep”, Orlando nodded. He launched into an explantion, “Funding for the beast corp comes from the emperor’s will, to keep the practice alive, and ”

“Well it is his fault, I mean”, Ota cut him off.

“Yes, Professor Ota. The modernisation of magic tools, despite building the empire, this city, and the academy, did mean that familiars became far less popular and desired”

Ota pulled back into her chair.

“Can I continue? Good. Funding for many subjects here comes from a bequeathment, but a small portion is set aside for students too. There’s a bizarre, long set of rules. ’Any Parent born in the city can join their child’, ‘Someone who saves the live of a professor’ and so on, there’s a tiny village that gets to send one child every 18 years.”

Ota mumbled something under her breath.

“and yes Ota, the student with the strongest familiar gets a scholarship. In the rules, it’s listed as ‘one who has the command of a beast that can defend the city’ and we’ve traditionally given it to the strongest in the beast corp, but I trust you have no objections with how I’m awarding it this year, Ota”

“No, Orland”

“So: Smithing as normal, Barrier Magic with Dys, Fitness with Ota”, turning to look at Agwa, then Adam, “and no-problems with you working on Agwa’s projects... at guild rates, yes Adam. Is everyone clear?”.

The room was quiet.

She’d passed.

Exercise with Ota every morning,

Magic two afternoons a week with Dys,

Working on Agwa’s projects in her spare time,

and three whole lectures about magic circuits every week.

She’d gotten a scholarship too.

Anu, incredibly relieved, slumped into her chair.

Under her breath, “Thank you Kay. We did it”

pat pat pat, Kay was a little patronising.

Seeing Any delighted, Orlando looked across the room at his other guests, “Is there anything else?”

knock knock

“Yes?”

“Um, Hello?”

A scraggy head popped around the door. A face that was one pipe short of a sea captain.

“I’m the registered emergency contact for one of your students, my brother’s apprentice, and I was told there was an accident.”

“Agwa, Ota, Adam, are we done here? Good. Come in, uh?”

“Nathan”

“Nathan?”, Anu was surprised.

He stared back at Anu, puzzled.

“I left you a letter... and my hair was red until this morning.”

His eyes widened “Anu!”

Orland stopped the introductions.

“As you can see, she’s safe and sound. Right. I have other things to do, as do you all. Anu, I’ll leave you in Nathan’s care. Come find me when term starts.”

Outside the headmasters office, Anu made promises:

She promised Agwa that she’d meet her later to talk about side projects.

She promised Adam that she’d meet him later and Yes She Would Read The Rule Book.

She just stared awkwardly at Ota.

“9am, sharp, tomorrow. Hall 312, Leave your familiar at home”

Ota confidently walked off, still worrying inside about Kay and trying not to show it.

Only Nathan was left.

“So, Anu?”

“Nathan?”

“Yep! Anu, I’m finished for the day, and was about grab dinner, would you care to join me?”

“Kay too?”, she pointed to the spider embedded in her hair.

“The familiar? Wasn’t it supposed to be ...”

“Yes, but they shrunk. Actually I just found out... actually, dinner sounds wonderful.”

Anu wondered if it would be a bad idea to explain that Kay could punch through stone and was likely more than twice her size, and decided it could wait until later.