Alex Lidell - The Cadet of Tildor

She frowned at him. Perhaps he’d had no choice in her punishment. “Did Master Verin make you discipline me as you did, sir?”

“No.” The crisp answer ensured no room for doubt. If anything, Savoy’s intense gaze claimed the act as a personal boon. “I requested it.”

Renee was silent. At last she understood.

Him. Savoy. The man she foolishly considered a friend, was just a bully who, having received a pounding from a larger kid, turned around to pass it on to a smaller one. She had stolen Sasha’s paper, a dishonorable, shameful act that ate at her guts. But instead of leaving the matter to a poor grade and the school’s routine discipline—down-rating, work details, quarters confinement, even a paddling from Headmaster Verin as younger students faced—Savoy had wanted to rub her face in her physical weakness, to make her surrender, humiliate her in front of others. Just as he had been. It was not discipline, it was retaliation. And it had come from the one person whose opinion she had permitted to matter so much. Too much. Alec had warned her. She should have listened and kept her distance.

Her face carefully void of her thoughts, Renee suggested they return to campus. Savoy’s company kindled too great a disgrace to bear.

Two days after Renee’s night at Rock Lake, winter’s full force slammed into Atham. Renee hid her bruises under heavy woolen tunics while she marooned herself in her quarters, burying her face in books when friends approached, and staring at the wall when alone. The Seventh left within the week, hurrying to ride out before the snow. She didn’t come out to wish them farewell. When Savoy addressed her in class, she held his gaze but bowed in silence. On the heels of Alec’s secret and Savoy’s humiliating idea of discipline, Renee’s mind pleaded for respite. Instead, it had life-altering exams to look forward to.

After a week of concerned glances and increasingly frustrated inquiries, Alec took action. “Renee,” he called, jogging down the barracks corridor to catch up. Uninvited, he followed her into her room and pulled the door closed.

Renee tensed, then reached into her desk drawer for ink. Seaborn still wanted a paper. Twenty journal pages due a week post practical exams. She needed to find a topic. And materials. The library, she should go there. “I—”

Taking the ink from her hand, Alec set it aside and took hold of her shoulders. He held on until Renee lifted her face to meet his gaze. “Whatever it is, I will not ask,” he said softly. “Neither will Sasha. All right?”

Renee’s mouth went dry. She drew her breath for another denial, but Alec’s eyes said none was necessary.

She pressed her forehead into his shoulder. It helped.

A few weeks later and with exams just six days away, the Board of Inquiry finally made its Queen’s Day rulings. Returning to their room that evening, Sasha sat herself in front of Renee, who looked up from her push-up set by way of greeting.

“The board just issued Savoy a letter of censure.” Sasha crossed her arms. “I heard all the evidence. They should have cleared him weeks ago, but Fisker kept pressing.”

Renee suppressed a twinge of perverted satisfaction. The letter would slap Savoy’s pride. It was unjust, of course, but in the colossal balance of pride infringement, it was somehow fair. If Fisker was hells bent on destroying Savoy’s career in vengeance for childhood pranks, it was the men’s problem. Her own career might face the gallows in a week. She had to focus on that.

“I think there’s a history with those two.” Sasha tipped her face to the ceiling. “It doesn’t make sense otherwise. You’d think Savoy was a Viper or Family man, the way Fisker went after him.”

Renee dusted her hands. They had a history all right, and Sasha knew it—she just didn’t know that she knew. “They don’t like each other.” Renee shrugged, trying to evict Savoy from her thoughts, and lowered herself for more push-ups. “The captain in the Palace Guard thought Savoy had something to do with Fisker losing his finger.”

For a moment, Sasha seemed as if she’d press the question, but then her brows twitched and she did not.

In the days to follow, exam anxiety loomed over all cadets—fighters and magistrates alike. For fighters, the midyear academic evaluation traditionally paled in comparison to the physical. That ratio would be reversed during end-of-year tests. At the moment, the end of year felt decades away, and so Renee disappeared into strength training. Only Diam and other young pages, who had taken to climbing the barracks’ rooftop to launch snowballs at passersby, seemed immune.

“Get back to bed,” Sasha scolded, waking during Renee’s undesired vigil the night before judgment day. Fruitless advice. One student would be dismissed the next day, and Renee had more riding on the exam marks than did her classmates.

At breakfast, Alec forced two rolls and a slice of cheese into her mouth. “You’ll see these again when I throw up,” she warned him.

He only grinned. “I’d hate to see you forgo tradition,” he said, shouldering his bag as they started back to her room to collect her equipment. “I think you’ve threatened to sick-up before every exam. And then passed.”

They found her door unlocked. Renee pushed the handle and felt her hand curl into a fist. “What are you doing in here?”

Tanil jerked and turned toward her. “You startled me,” he said, color creeping back into his pale face.

“How did you get in?”

He squinted at her. “Turned the handle, same as you. Didn’t you leave the door open on purpose?” Digging into his coat, the boy pulled out a key and flicked it to her. “I found it on the ground and didn’t wish you in trouble. Sorry. My mistake.” Without waiting for a reply, Tanil turned on his heels and left the room. The door slammed in his wake.

Renee compared the new key to the copy she and Alec made on the first day of classes. “Looks worn.” She surveyed the room for evidence of sabotage. “I think it really is the original. How long you think he’s had it?”

“Long enough to do this.” Alec held up her dress coat, freshly decorated with mud smears. “Do you have another?”

“No.” She ground her teeth. With no time for cleaning, a dress shirt alone would have to suffice. Cold but still proper. She rubbed her arms and regretted it. They were tender still. Shaking her head, she grabbed her equipment bag and hurried to the training hall.

The salle had undergone its biannual morph. Several rows of benches appeared by the door at the west end of the room. A judges’ dais draped with black and blue covers dominated the east end. Renee’s gaze flowed over the ground, raked flat and neat. Several years ago a cadet ripped his knee after tripping on a clump of sand.

A cluster of junior students buzzed around a long wooden table, arranging mugs of water. Healer Grovener, immaculate as always, settled into his designated chair, drilling the examinees with a critical gaze. Tradition mandated disqualification to any student the Healer’s hand touched.

“We have little time.” Alec steered Renee toward the far benches.

She followed his lead, pulling pads from her bag and fitting them on. They looked odd. When she realized why, every muscle in her body tensed. The laces of her gear were all severed.

Renee checked one useless piece of padded armor after another. Panic and disbelief made her hands tremble. Her gaze scoured the room for something she could use. Spare gear. The salle usually housed crates of old, but mostly serviceable, items.

“Where did the common pads go?” she asked, unable to find the stash.