Chapter X

His orb guided him through the corridors back towards his dormitory. Instead of doors, he was back in the halls filled with paintings. He watched as students entered into a dull looking painting filled with desks and chairs. He pressed a hand up against it and a blink of an eye later, he stood in the classroom.

Notably more students attended the class than his F classes earlier in the day. At least twice as many. He looked for familiar faces, trying to spot the girl from yesterday’s party who’d mentioned she attended the same class.

Finn sat in the middle of the class. He scowled but Kizu didn’t think he’d even noticed him yet. He debated sitting down next to his brother. He remembered what Arclight had said about being the worst students, the only place to go would be up. The same seemed to apply to his relationship with Finn. He doubted he could make it any worse.

His brother’s frown morphed into a look of pure horror when Kizu sat down next to him.

“How’s the first day back at classes?” Kizu asked him.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Finn spluttered. “You’re the worst at everything! I heard it said by like ten different people yesterday!”

“Orb, what place am I in Enchanting?”

“Your current placement is 382nd,” the orb said, bouncing slightly.

“So, not the worst in the academy?”

“No, there are currently 418 students beneath your enchanting level.”

He grinned and looked at his brother. “Sorry Finn, you’re stuck with me. Now, who’s the teacher of this class?”

Finn looked panicked as his eyes darted around the room as if seeking out some sort of escape. A couple of students snickered at him but most just rolled their eyes.

“Go sit somewhere else!” Finn demanded. “People are laughing at you and I don’t want to be associated with you.”

“I think our association with one another was kind of arranged at birth,” Kizu said. But he reluctantly stood up. “I’ll move.”

Finn gave him a little push on his back, as if trying to repel him as quickly as possible. He glared daggers at Kizu as he moved down the row and sat back down.

“Do you know him?” a student asked from beside him. He wore a headband and a lazy eye kept drifting to the side.

“Yeah, he’s my brother.”

“Oof. I don’t envy you that. I was in two classes with him last semester. Kid’s driven to be the best in the room at all times. Takes that leaderboard seriously and views us all as competition.”

“So he doesn’t have any friends?”

“Shouldn’t you know that? You’re his brother, I’m just a random bystander.”

“I’ve been away from home for a while,” Kizu quickly explained. “What else do you know about Finn?”

“Not very much. And I don’t really care to learn more. Too likely to snitch if you get close. Now let’s shut up. Professor Kateshi just walked in.”

Kizu recognized the tired looking woman as the same as the Restoration and Rejuvenation teacher that had checked up on all the students after the combat test. His hand went to his left ear where the enchanted stud pierced.

“Yes, yes,” she said, exasperated. “Let’s settle down now. Another semester ahead of us. Most of you should know the routine by now. Today we’ll be looking at enchanting some pieces of scrap metal.”

She waved her hand and shards of metal appeared on the desks. Kizu picked his up and turned it over in his hand, careful not to cut himself on the edges. It truly embodied the word ‘scrap.’ The coloring was a dull red from rust and it was destroyed to the point of making its previous use completely ambiguous.

“Today I just want to see how you’re all still doing after the long break. Enchant it to do something nice and I’ll walk around and see what you’ve got.”

Kizu stared at the metal. Wondering what to do with it. The crone had taught him a little bit of what to do. He ran a finger down the edge of it and gave the object a purpose. The simpler the purpose, the less it took out of him.

Stick.

He set the shard down on the desk and looked over at the guy with the lazy eye. He seemed to be concentrating really hard on the object. Kizu wondered what he was trying to do with it. Probably something complicated. Then a jolt of worry rang through him. What if his simple spell wasn’t enough. The last thing he wanted to do was embarrass himself in a class with Finn. But before he could work at undoing it, Professor Kateshi picked it up.

“Finished already?” She frowned at the metal in her hand. Then her eyes widened. Her expression flipped from surprise, to irritation, to a slight smile.

“Sorry,” Kizu started. “I didn’t expect-”

“No, no. This is actually quite impressive. You’ve masked it quite effectively. I thought you hadn’t bothered to do anything to it until after I picked it up. Certainly, if I paid more attention to my spell sense I would have picked up on it, but still.”

She flipped her hand upside down but the metal stuck to her palm. She muttered something and then tapped the metal with her other hand’s finger. It clattered to the desk.

“It’s been a few years since a student tricked me into snatching up a cursed item.” Then she stopped and thought for a second. “Actually, I believe your sister was the last one to try something like that.”

He didn’t need to look to know that Finn was staring daggers at him. He sighed. If he embarrassed himself, Finn would be upset, but if he was successful, Finn would also be upset. Kizu quickly came to the realization that nothing he did would satisfy his little brother. Nothing beyond disappearing into the aether forever. As the rest of the class went on, he wondered about how to please such an irritable person.

He didn’t bother trying to catch up with his brother as class ended, instead opting to sit back and wait for the room to empty before rising. He approached the professor who stood in the front, removing the enchantments from the class’s props.

“Pardon me,” he said.

She looked up and raised an eyebrow.

“You said you knew my sister, Anna. Could you tell me about her?”

Professor Kateshi hesitated, then rubbed her temples. “I knew you’d be trouble. Slip of my tongue. I need to watch what I say in the future. No, I cannot tell you about her. And what I know about her probably wouldn’t be what you’re interested in anyway.”

“You’re not even allowed to talk about her at all? What did she do?”

“Even most of the professors aren’t certain what occurred. I’m sorry, Mr. Kaga, but I believe you need to hurry if you intend to reach your next class on time.”

With that, she excused him and went back to her work.

The way up to the astronomy class was just a straight path up stairs. At first he took them two at a time, in an attempt to make up for lost time, but that quickly left him exhausted. By the time he reached the top of the tower, he was sweaty and hot. He got more than one quizzical glance as he took a seat next to Harvey.

The classroom was unlike the other ones he had visited so far. The seats were simple cushions on the floor that circled around the room. The center of the room remained clear.

“Man, everyone’s talking about you walking out of class earlier. People keep coming up to me and asking about it.”

“Really?” Kizu said. “Nobody’s said anything to me.”

“Well, at least two people asked. And one of them was even a babe.”

“I hardly think two people equates to everybody,” Kizu said dryly.

Harvey shrugged off the comment. “You missed the homework assignment, by the way. We’re supposed to have twenty pages read by tomorrow.”

“Homework? We just started classes today! None of the other classes have assigned me anything.”

“Yeah, same here. Hopefully that trend keeps,” Harvey said with a sharp tooth grin.

The lights of the classroom dimmed to darkness. Kizu felt a brief moment of panic, reliving the experience from earlier in the day. But a few rapid blinks later, his vision adjusted and he could see perfectly again.

A small ball of bluish light appeared in the center of the room. At first, he thought it was someone’s scrying orb, but as he looked closer, he couldn’t make out any sign of a glass ball. It seemed to simply be a blue light. Like a star or a sun.

“Welcome,” it said. “For those of you who do not know me, I am Professor Grove, I will be your professor for this class.”

“What is it?” Harvey said, not as quietly as Kizu would have liked.

“She is a wisp, obviously,” a boy said beside Harvey.

They glared at one another. Then the domed ceiling overhead lit up with tens of thousands of stars, silencing both students.

It only took Kizu a moment before he began to recognize the familiar sky’s patterns. The crone’s lessons in the dark of night returned to him.

“Astronomy is fascinating,” Professor Grove said. “It’s something that transcends to every culture across the world. In a way, the night sky unites us all. Like this academy, the stars belong to no one culture or nation, but to all living creatures of the surface. And I look forward to expanding your knowledge and understanding of them in this class. Using astronomy, we can see glimpses into the cosmic past and future. The stars reflect a magic that our understanding barely grasps at.”

And so she began with her lecture. Whenever she mentioned a specific set of constellations, they would light up brighter. Kizu listened with interest as she spoke about some of the more obvious constellations and how to find them in the night sky. However, every time she mentioned one, it was by some name unfamiliar to him. He did his best to remember that the Moth was now Jin and that the Gnarled Hand was now Besillna, Tree of Sacrifice and so on. He noted with a bit of irritation, that the academy’s names for constellations were a lot more reliant on the looker to know specific people and artifacts. But, on the flip side, he soon realized that each one also carried with it a story. He made a mental note to find a book with some of the stories later.

Professor Grove’s voice was soothing as she spoke and with the constellations overhead, he felt almost at home in the class. When the bell rang and light returned to the room, he found himself disappointed it passed so quickly.

Harvey stirred beside him and Kizu was shocked to realize his friend had been sleeping through the lecture. Kizu had to practically haul him out of the door.

“How did you manage to stay awake that whole time?” Harvey yawned, showcasing his sharp teeth. “It was so dark and the wisp’s speech made me so sleepy. I can’t believe everyone in the room wasn’t asleep.”

Kizu didn’t know what to say. Astronomy had rejuvenated his energy, not leached it. He just continued walking down the spiraling stairs, wishing silently that his uniform wasn’t made of such thick cloth.