Nanette's Tale

Chapter 4

“Welcome, Princess,” Lauran said. She was a tall willowy girl with light brown skin and gimlet eyes. “Did you sleep well?”

Nanette gave her a nasty look as she followed Penny into the classroom. Penny had introduced her to a handful of other girls, all of whom seemed to take an instant dislike to her. Nanette wasn’t sure if that was deliberate — Penny didn’t strike her as being devious enough to socially isolate her, at least from her own clique — but it was a little annoying. In her experience, it was only a matter of time before snide remarks and taunts gave way to jinxes and hexes. She could have deflected them, at the cost of admitting she was better at magic than she claimed. She’d have to make a show of practicing…

Or let them underestimate me, she reminded herself. Compared to nearly dying, being hexed was nothing. Better they think of me an idiot.

She surveyed the classroom thoughtfully as the rest of the girls filed in. Thirty desks and chairs, each rickety and old. Penny had warned her not to sit until the doors were closed, cautioning her that the older students had already picked their chairs. It was good thinking on her part, Nanette supposed as the door closed, but it was just as irritating as everything else. The only free chairs were right at the front. She sat down reluctantly, mildly surprised someone hadn’t cast a whoopee charm on the seat. That would have been a fine start to the day.

A wave of magic ran through the room as the teacher strode out of the backroom and took her place in front of the desks. Nanette rather thought she would have identified the Charms Mistress even without Penny’s rather slanted take on the teaching staff. Mistress Jens looked very much like the other charms teachers she’d met, right down to the tight-lipped demeanour and wooden ruler in hand. She’d smack a student’s hand, rather than let them cast an imprecise and potentially dangerous charm. Her dark face, darker eyes and grim disposition made it clear no one would dare misbehave in her class.

“Open your textbooks to the current chapter,” Mistress Jens said. She directed a stern look at Nanette. “That’s chapter seven, in case you were wondering.”

Nanette didn’t have to work to feign embarrassment. Nadine would have been in for a nasty shock if she hadn’t read the preceding chapters — and how could she, when she didn’t even know when and where she’d be joining the school? Nanette had passed through the section last year, but Nadine might not even have started. She pursued her lips as she found the right section, trying to pretend to be having difficulty reading. It wasn’t that much of a pretence. The textbook was written in a spidery hand that was difficult to comprehend.

The teacher launched into a long and complicated lecture, detailing how one could adapt a simple levitation charm to fly. Nanette would have been fascinated, under other circumstances. The idea of flying sounded appealing until someone cast a cancellation charm and sent the unfortunate magician falling to her doom, but Mistress Jens seemed to believe it was eminently survivable. She talked about a flurry of rotating charms, each one providing a different aspect of the whole. Nanette had trouble following the explanation. She was grimly sure Nadine would have been lost, right from the start.

She rubbed her forehead as she scanned the page, making a show of having problems reading the text. Nadine could read, if the reports were accurate, but not very well. Her parents probably hadn’t put her nose to the grindstone and forced her to learn. The nobility schooled their daughters, but some of the more old-fashioned families thought it a waste of time. It wouldn’t do to give the girls ideas. And, of course, it might make them unmarriageable.

Idiots, Nanette thought. Who do they think manages the estate when the husband goes off to war?

The ruler cracked against her desk. She looked up. Mistress Jens was glaring down at her. “Well? Are you paying attention?”

“I’m trying,” Nanette whined. “It just isn’t…”

Mistress Jens scowled. “Can’t you read?”

“I’m trying,” Nanette repeated. A titter echoed through the room. “I’m just not used to…”

“We are not having any of the fancy learning in this room,” Mistress Jens snarled. It took Nanette a moment to realise she meant the New Learning. Emily’s New Learning. “And you will learn to read properly.”

“I can read,” Nanette protested, weakly. “I’m just not very good at it.”

“Well, you’d better get better,” Mistress Jens said. She nodded towards the rear of the chamber. “Penny, sit next to Nadine. Help her.”

Nanette concealed her amusement behind a blank facade. Penny wouldn’t be too pleased at being forced to sit at the front, even though it was unlikely she wanted to do anything that would irritate the teacher. Charms tutors tended to have nasty senses of humour when it came to forcing students to pay attention. Mistress Jens was actually the mildest tutor she’d met. Penny shot Nanette a knowing look as she sat down, placing her textbook between them. It was open to a different page.

Mistress Jens silenced a couple of snickering girls with a glare, then stalked back to the front of the room and resumed her lecture. Nanette listened, doing her best to pretend to be bright but limited. The spellwork was incredibly complex, tricky even at the best of times. It smacked more of a ritual than anything else, a combination of spells cast by separate magicians that merged into one. She wondered if she should be concerned. Ritual magic was never very safe.

“It is important you master this before you go flying,” Penny muttered, her finger tracing a line of text. “If the spell fails when you’re in the air…”

“Splat,” Nanette finished. The spellwork claimed it was resistant to tampering — and cancellation — but she had her doubts. It might lower her to the ground gently or it might simply drop her from a great height. “Do you go flying?”

“All the time.” Penny grinned at her. “I love it and…”

“Hold out your hands,” Mistress Jens snapped. “Both of you.”

“Sorry,” Nanette muttered, as she obeyed. “I…”

Mistress Jens brought the ruler down across her palm. She yelped in pain, trying to pretend it was the worst thing that had ever happened to her. Beside her, Penny took the punishment stoically. Nanette heard sniggers from behind her and gritted her teeth. By the time the class was done, she’d be well-established as a stupid and utterly unreliable wimp. She was going to have to work hard, but not too hard. Learning too quickly would draw unwanted attention.

“It could be worse,” Penny said. She studied the nasty red mark on her hand thoughtfully. “I think…”

“It will be worse if you don’t pay attention,” Mistress Jens said. “Now, if you don’t mind, what are the four variables of conjuration in flying?”

Penny rose. “Height, weight, speed and resistance.”

“Correct.” Mistress Jens didn’t look happy. “And what do you do if one of the four becomes unbalanced?”

“You either enhance the others or lower the unbalanced variable,” Penny said. “At worst, you land and recast the spell.”

“Here, you always land,” Mistress Jens said. “If you want to get yourself killed by fiddling with the spell in midflight, you can do it somewhere else.”

Nanette nodded as Penny sat down. The flying spells were tough, particularly the ones the students had to cast on their own. And they had to be constantly refreshed when the magician was in flight or one of the variables would unbalance. She made a show of puzzling through the text, trying to sort out what was what while memorising the technique. Being able to fly would give her an advantage, particularly if no one knew she could do it. She honestly wasn’t sure why the technique wasn’t taught at other schools. If nothing else, the certainty of falling to one’s death was an excellent incentive to get the magic right.

They probably lost a few students and gave up, Nanette told herself. And reasoned that a cancellation spell could interfere with anyone’s flying.

She breathed a sigh of relief as the class came to an end. Mistress Jens assigned homework, gave Nanette a stern warning not to fly — the other girls laughed — and then dismissed them. Penny stood, shoved her textbook in her bag and headed for the door. Nanette followed, wondering what Penny would say when they were alone. Would she suspect Nanette was playing dumb? Or would she merely protest having to leave her friends?

A stinging hex struck her backside. She turned to see Lauran. “Why can’t you read, aristo girl?”

Nanette rubbed her bottom. It would be easy, so easy, to blast Lauran right down the corridor. The girl wasn’t holding herself like a duellist. It was clear she expected Nanette to grin and take whatever Lauran intended to dish out. Nanette could give Lauran the fright of her life, but it would blow her cover spectacularly. She’d have to settle for promising herself revenge at a later date.

“My mother never saw the value of reading,” she said. It was true enough, although the New Learning was changing everything. “My tutors didn’t give me a proper grounding.”

“You’ll never get anywhere with that attitude.” Lauran gave her a mock-wave. “Bye-bye.”

“She does have a point,” Penny said, as Lauran ambled down the corridor. “You do have to learn to read.”

“I can read,” Nanette protested. “Just slowly.”

“Very slowly,” Penny said. The bell rang. “Come on. We’ll be late for class.”

Nanette kept her thoughts to herself as she followed Penny into the potions’ classroom. The tutor — a scarred woman who looked as if she’d been in one too many accidents — ordered them to share a table, then launched into a complicated lecture on advanced healing potions. They would have been challenging under any circumstances, Nanette was sure, but all the more when she was pretending to be stupid. She cursed her luck under her breath as they were told to start brewing. Penny already knew she was hiding something. She wouldn’t be particularly tolerant of mistakes that led to explosions. She might even swallow her pride and report Nanette to her superiors.

And they might start looking too closely, Nanette thought, as she carefully chopped and deseeded the herbs. Who knows what they’ll find?

She sighed, inwardly, as she passed the ingredients to Penny. The tutors might find nothing, beyond an aristocratic girl trying to conceal her full powers. Or they might find the real Nadine. Nanette considered, briefly, going back to Pendle and disposing of Nadine permanently, then dismissed the thought. The brat had magic in her bloodline. Killing her might have all sorts of unwanted consequences. And moving her elsewhere might draw attention too.

The teacher stalked the room, checking on cauldron after cauldron. Nanette smiled as the tutor rebuked Lauran for a minor mistake, then ticked off two of the other girls for not chopping their ingredients properly. Healing potions were particularly unforgiving, she repeated time and time again; it was easy, all too easy, to produce a deadly poison instead of medicine. Or something that worked, technically, but had unfortunate and unpleasant side effects. Nanette had had the lecture herself, back at Mountaintop. She knew the risks.

An explosion shook the room. She ducked as hot liquid splattered everywhere, despite the wards. The tutor cleaned up the mess with a wave of her hand, then dispatched the unfortunate brewers to the gym mistress. Nanette winced, although she knew the tutor couldn’t take risks. They weren’t brewing harmless potions, not now. A single mistake could easily get them killed.

“Not bad,” the tutor said, when she inspected their work. “However, next time, I expect both of you to do the brewing.”

“I’m not very practiced,” Nanette said. Penny had insisted on doing the brewing personally, if only to ensure Nanette didn’t make a mistake. “I…”

“Then it’s time you got practiced,” the tutor snapped. “You can attend my evening sessions, every Monday and Thursday night.”

Nanette nodded. Behind her, she heard more snickers. She was getting sick of that sound already. And it was only her very first day. The sooner she inspected the library and found a way to get the book out, the better. She’d leave the students with a little present as she left, she decided. Perhaps she could give Lauran and her fellow mean girls a taste of real danger.

Penny nudged her as the bell rang. “What do you have after lunch?”

“Emotional Stability,” Nanette said. She was quite curious. Neither Mountaintop nor Whitehall had had anything of the sort. “What is it?”

“You’ll be in with the little girls,” Penny said. She sounded genuinely sympathetic, rather than mocking. “Sorry.”

“Thanks,” Nanette said. She packed up her books and followed Penny to the door. “Lunch now?”

“Yeah.” Penny groaned. “And it’s a Monday too.”

Nanette said nothing as they walked down to the dining hall and took their place. The food looked awful, compared to the dinners served at other schools, although she had to admit there was a lot of it. Boiled ham, boiled potatoes, boiled vegetables… the smell made her stomach churn, even though she knew she should be grateful to have it. The younger students handed out plates of food and poured glasses of water, then hurried to their own tables before the second bell rang. Nanette forced herself to eat. She wasn’t that hungry, but she’d learnt the hard way to eat when she could.

“This weekend, try and eat in Pendle if you can,” Penny said. “The food there is much better.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” Nanette said. She grimaced as she tasted the ham. She had no idea what it had been boiled in, but her imagination provided too many answers. Brine? Or something even worse? “How do you keep from starving?”

“Midnight feasts,” Penny said. “We’ll have one in a couple of weeks. Just you wait and see.”

Nanette nodded and surveyed the room. The girls looked strikingly alike — the younger ones in grey, the older ones in black — but it was easy to pick out the cliques and factions. Lauran was holding court in the middle of a group of girls who were clearly from magical families… Nanette blinked in surprise as she realised the group had girls of all ages. Mixed-age groups were largely unknown at Mountaintop. Even the quarrels hesitated to recruit people who were too young. The only student they’d sought to recruit before she entered her final year was Emily. Nanette had never been considered…

She put the surge of sudden hatred out of her mind as her eyes swept the room. One clique was probably composed of aristocrats, girls from a dozen different nations bound together by a shared belief their blood made them superior. She didn’t recognise any of the faces, but that meant nothing. The paintings she’d seen bore very little resemblance to reality. Another clique was clearly composed of commoners, banding together against the magical and mundane aristocracy. And there were more… sporty girls, smart girls, girls who were more interested in girls than boys… it was easy to pick them out. Nanette smiled, coldly. She hadn’t wasted her lessons after all. Who knew? Maybe she could find a way to turn the class divisions to her advantage.

There may be no boys here, she thought, but otherwise… it’s just like Mountaintop.

Penny nudged her. “I’m meant to be going flying after lunch,” she said. “Are you going to join me?”

“I can’t,” Nanette said. She rather doubted Penny had forgotten. The Young Head Girl was trying to put her in her place. “I’ve got the new class. Remember?”

“Yes,” Penny said. “I remember.”

Rubbing it in a bit, aren’t you? Nanette tried to look downcast. As long as you don’t guess the real secret…

She shrugged, dismissively. “If flying is so great, why isn’t it taught at the other schools?”

“Women are better at it,” Penny said. “And they don’t want us to show up the boys.”

Nanette frowned. It was possible, she supposed, but unlikely. She’d studied the charms carefully. There was no hint they’d work better for women, unlike some of the spells she’d seen that were linked to virginity or… or simply couldn’t be applied to the other gender. She wasn’t sure what would happen if a man cast an anti-cramping spell, but she was certain it would be pointless. And besides, who in their right mind would give up a source of power just because women were better at it than men? The magical community wasn’t mundane.

“Really?” She tried to sound doubtful. “Is that true?”

“Yep.” Penny winked. “And there’s also the prospect of being able to fly away from an unwanted husband.”

“Or simply turning him into a frog,” Nanette pointed out. A sorcerer would be able to stop his wife flying away, if he wished. “Why waste energy on flying away?”

Penny shrugged. “That’s what I was told,” she said, as the bell rang. “And you know what? It doesn’t matter. Flying is fun!”

“I’ll take your word for it,” Nanette said. “What now?”

“Now, you go study with the little girls,” Penny said. She patted Nanette’s back in mock-commiseration. “I’ll see you afterwards.”

“Sure.” Nanette stood and glanced around the room. The cliques really were for girls of all ages. What was so bad about studying with the younger girls, if it was a class one had never taken? “I’ll see you this evening.”