Thirteenth Child

CHAPTER 9

NOBODY WAS QUITE SURE HOW BRANT WILSON HAD TALKED DR. McNeil into letting him go west to study the wildlife, but he’d done it, and he was elated by the chance. Our whole family went down to see them off at the Settler’s Pier, where all the people who were heading west to the settlements went to be ferried across the Mammoth River in big, flat-bottom boats. I didn’t know ‘til I got there that it was going to be a big send-off, with Mr. Harrison, the new head of the North Plains Territory Homestead Claim and Settlement Office, making a speech. If I’d known that, I’d have played sick and stayed home. As it was, I hid behind Papa in the crowd and didn’t hear a word the man said. I did take a real good look at Mr. Harrison himself, though, so I’d know him and could dodge away if I saw him on the street.

The doctors said I was still delicate and had to stay quiet, so the summer was nearly as boring as the winter had been. I didn’t even have visits from Papa’s students, once the college finished up for the summer. Luckily, everyone decided that I was well enough to go back to the day school in the fall, or I think I’d have just about gone crazy.

The year I’d spent being sick put another big wedge between me and Lan. I’d always known that when he started coming into his power, he’d blaze ahead of me in his magic lessons, but I’d thought we’d at least be together in our regular classes. Instead, he was a year ahead in everything, and I was back with the tagalongs a year younger than either of us. The few girls I’d begun to know were not that interested in talking with someone a year behind them, and when they did try, we didn’t have much to talk about. I didn’t know what had been happening in their classes, and they weren’t interested in what was going on in mine.

Most of the teachers made things worse, trying to make them better. They stood me up in front of the room on the first day and talked about the rheumatic fever and me missing a whole year of school, and how everyone should be extra kind and welcoming now that I was back. By the time they finished, there wasn’t one single one of my new classmates who dared say hello, either because they feared to catch whatever I’d had or because they feared a teacher would see and decide they hadn’t been kind or welcoming enough.

If it hadn’t been for Miss Ochiba and William, I’d have gone staring mad in the first month. When I got to Miss Ochiba’s magic class, she read my name in order, along with everyone else’s, just as if I’d always been there. I’d almost have believed she hadn’t noticed I’d missed a whole year, if she hadn’t stopped me at the door after class and said, “It is good to see you back, Miss Rothmer. I expect that you will catch up very rapidly in your magic lessons, if you choose to do so.”

“Uh, thank you, Miss Ochiba,” I stammered.

She gave me a penetrating look, then raised her voice just a little and looked over my shoulder. “Do remember that I wish to be informed of any extra lessons your families may decide to add to your training.”

“Yes, Miss Ochiba,” I murmured, and I heard another voice in back of me muttering the same thing. I slipped out the door and blew a sigh of relief, and William ran into me from behind.

“Sorry, Eff,” William said. At ten, he was short and he’d put on just enough weight to be called wiry instead of skinny. He glanced back, but the classroom door was closed. He heaved an even bigger sigh than I had. “She meant that last for me, you know.”

“I think she meant it for both of us,” I said. “Otherwise she wouldn’t have said it so we both heard. Miss Ochiba always knows exactly what she’s doing, that way.”

“I suppose.” William looked back at the door again, then down at his feet. “You want me to tell her that your father isn’t like mine? Giving extra magic lessons and things, I mean. Well, except with Lan, but he’s—” He broke off and glanced at me and then back down.

“He’s special,” I finished for him as we walked toward our regular classroom. “He’s the seventh son of a seventh son, and I’m—” I caught myself just in time to keep from saying I was an unlucky thirteenth, and changed it to “—just his twin sister.”

“You’re special, too,” William said fiercely. “You’re just quiet about it.”

I looked at him in surprise, but he didn’t add anything more and I couldn’t ask what he meant because we’d arrived at our next class and Miss Jensen was waiting impatiently for us to take our seats so she could start on the math lesson for the day.

I thought about what William had said, and what Miss Ochiba had said, off and on for the rest of the day, and then some more that evening. William was right, but not the way he thought he was. Being a thirteenth child was just as important as being a double-seventh son, only in the opposite direction. And nobody had told Miss Ochiba what I was.

It took me two full days more to work up the courage to talk to Miss Ochiba, though I could plainly see that if I didn’t do it, nobody else would. Lan wouldn’t give me away, and Robbie and Allie wouldn’t think of it. Nan and Jack were in the upper school, with no reason to come back and talk to the day-school teachers, and Papa and Mama were still too mad at Uncle Earn, even after all that time, to stop and think that he might have been right. But it was a hard, hard thing to pause after Miss Ochiba’s class and ask her if I could stop in to talk for a minute at the end of the day, privately.

What got me to actually do it, instead of dithering for another week, was the thought that not warning Miss Ochiba would be just the sort of thing I’d do if I were starting to go bad. That scared me, almost as much as the Settlement Office. Uncle Earn had never said when I was supposed to go bad, and I’d always kind of assumed that it wouldn’t happen until I finished school and got to be grown up enough to make some real trouble. But I didn’t know for sure and certain, and if it went and happened earlier…I could see that I’d have to be extra careful, so it didn’t sneak up on me before I could warn people.

I worried and fretted about that talk all day and got two bad marks for inattention in reading and history. I thought about taking it back, or saying I wasn’t feeling well and needed to go straight home. But that would just be putting it off, because I knew Miss Ochiba wouldn’t forget.

So when school was over for the day, I went into the big room where Miss Ochiba taught her magic classes. Miss Ochiba was just locking up the big cupboard where she kept all the ingredients for the spells she taught, and there were two older boys and one girl from the last class still fiddling with little brooms and dust cloths at the big tables across the back. The girl giggled and whispered to the boy next to her when she saw me.

“I will be with you in a moment, Miss Rothmer,” Miss Ochiba said as I hesitated in the doorway. “Take a seat on the left, if you please.”

The girl at the worktable had seen me come in. She glanced from me to Miss Ochiba’s back. Her eyes widened, and she nudged the boy next to her and whispered some more. Miss Ochiba turned and gave the girl a long look. A moment later, the top of the table made a popping sound, and a bright green cloud puffed up, right into the girl’s face. A smaller cloud puffed in front of one of the boys; the other one jumped back, though nothing seemed to be happening to his part of the table.

“Well done, Mr. Legrande,” Miss Ochiba said. “Miss Wilkerson, Mr. Cohen, I trust that after this you will remember that cleaning up after a spell requires as much care and attention as casting it.”

The smoke began to clear, and I saw that the girl’s hair and face and the whole front of her calico dress were colored bright green. The boy was blue from his nose down. They looked at each other in horror, while the second boy gave a bark of laughter, then darted a scared look at Miss Ochiba.

“Just so, Mr. Legrande,” Miss Ochiba said. “I believe you are all finished for the day. You may go.”

The boy who hadn’t turned color gave her a wide-eyed look and bolted out of the room. The other boy hesitated, and the girl burst into tears. “I can’t leave like this!” she wailed. “Miss Ochiba, how long will this last?”

“One day,” Miss Ochiba replied.

“A day! How am I going to get home without anyone seeing me? What am I going to tell my parents? Miss Ochiba, can’t you do something? This is humiliating!”

“Humility is as good for the soul as it is for the memory” Miss Ochiba said, and her lips twitched as if she was trying not to smile. She handed each of the two unnaturally-colored students a note. “Give that to your parents. I shall expect you in class tomorrow, coloration and all.”

“No!” the girl said. “I can’t—I won’t! Everyone will laugh at me.”

“You are neither the first nor, I fear, the last to need such a reminder. Be thankful I intervened; the usual result of that particular mistake is a set of tentacles that are extremely painful to remove.”

The blue boy looked suddenly very thoughtful. The girl didn’t seem to hear. “Please, Miss Ochiba!”

“Twenty-four hours,” Miss Ochiba replied implacably, and shooed the two of them out the door.

“Now, Miss Rothmer,” she said, crossing back to the table where I sat. “I believe you wished to speak with me. I hope this unfortunate incident has not put you off.”

“N-no, Miss Ochiba,” I said. After watching those three students, I had the feeling Miss Ochiba could handle just about anything, even a thirteenth child. I wasn’t sure I’d like it much, but that was beside the point. But now that I was here, I didn’t know quite how to begin. I’d kept silent on the subject for eight years, ever since we moved to Mill City, and the habit was just about as strong as the fear that lay behind it. And that old fear was as strong as it had ever been. On top of it, I was afraid of how Miss Ochiba would see me once she knew.

My head was near certain that talking to Miss Ochiba was the right thing to do, but my heart wanted to turn around and run. I managed to keep my feet from moving, but I couldn’t get my mouth started. I just sat there, feeling scared and tongue-tied.

“Was it something regarding your magic lessons?” Miss Ochiba prompted after a minute.

“Yes. I mean, no, not exactly. I—” I twisted my fingers together and looked down at my hands. “You know Lan’s a seventh son. Well, there are seven of us girls, too.”

Miss Ochiba studied me, frowning slightly. I waited for her to do the addition, but her expression didn’t change. Finally I said, “I’m a thirteenth child, Miss Ochiba.”

“So I gather,” Miss Ochiba said, tapping one finger lightly against the tabletop.

“I-I thought you ought to know,” I said. “Since you’re doing the magic teaching. Uncle Earn said—” I stopped, because Miss Ochiba’s eyes had narrowed and she was nodding. “You know Uncle Earn?”

“Not in the least, nor do I wish to,” Miss Ochiba said. “I take it that your uncle is a primitive Pythagorean, and has inflicted his unfortunate views on you?”

“Uh—” We’d studied about Pythagoras in our magic-history classes, two years before, but I didn’t remember it as well as I should have. “Pythagoras started number magic?” I said.

Miss Ochiba beamed. “Very good, Miss Rothmer.” Her voice took on the lecturing tone she used in class. “Pythagoras laid the numerical foundation for both mathematics and magic. Unfortunately like many of the ancient Greeks, his work was not always as rigorous as it might have been.”

“You mean he was wrong about thirteenth children being evil and unlucky?” I said.

“Say rather that his comprehension was woefully incomplete,” Miss Ochiba replied. “Which is no serious fault in Pythagoras, who lived over two thousand years ago and did not have the benefit of later work to improve his understanding, but is inexcusable in anyone with a modern education.”

My heart sank. Even if I didn’t remember much about Pythagoras, I knew that “woefully incomplete” didn’t mean wrong.

“So it’s really true,” I blurted.

Miss Ochiba made a clucking noise. “Miss Rothmer, you appear to be a sensible young woman. Consider. Yes, in Avrupan numerancy the number thirteen is associated with a variety of ills, and yes, you are without question a thirteenth child. But you are also a seventh daughter, and the number seven has as much or more association with positive power and good luck as the number thirteen has with bad.” Her eyes narrowed suddenly and she looked at me with an extra-thoughtful expression. “Is your mother by chance a seventh daughter?”

I had to think for a minute which of my aunts were Mama’s sisters and which were sisters-in-law. “No, ma’am. Mama has two sisters and two brothers.”

“Then you are not a double-seventh daughter,” Miss Ochiba said. “But you are the first of twins, a position second only to being the eldest in a family for imparting self-mastery and general authority. Taking a wider view, I presume that with your father’s family being so large you have some number of cousins; so long as you have even one who is older than you, you cannot be your paternal grandfather’s thirteenth grandchild. Are there cousins on your mother’s side of the family? More than one, older than you are?”

I nodded.

“Then you cannot be your maternal grandfather’s thirteenth grandchild, either. I daresay you were not born on the thirteenth day of the month, and as there are only twelve months, you cannot have been born in the thirteenth month of any year. You are not old enough to have been born in the thirteenth year of this century. All these numbers, and more, have meanings and importance, according to Avrupan numerancy theory.”

My head was whirling, but not enough to miss noticing that she’d made a point of mentioning Avrupa twice. I frowned. “Miss Ochiba, are you saying that all those numbers don’t mean anything in other kinds of magic?”

Miss Ochiba smiled. “Some of them don’t mean anything; others don’t mean the same things. Hijero—Cathayan number magic is quite different from Avrupan, and the Aphrikan tradition hardly deals with numbers at all.”

“Different how?” I asked suspiciously.

“The Hijero-Cathayans view life as a process of change,” Miss Ochiba replied. “A small child is not the same as a young man or woman, and a youth is not the same as a parent or an elder, though they may have been born on the same day and have similar places in their respective families. Since the day of birth does not change, the Hijero—Cathayans change the meaning of the number. A thirteenth child—” She stopped and looked at me, then went to a small cupboard at the back of the room. She took down a short, fat book bound in faded red leather and leafed through it for a moment.

“What does it say?”

“‘Thirteen is of fire and heaven, thus of the sun,’“ Miss Ochiba read. “‘The changes are also of the sun. At dawn, the fire is cool and distant, growing stronger and more passionate as the sun climbs the sky. At noon, the heat is greatest, for good or ill. The afternoon holds strength until the sun falls into twilight. Travel up or travel down; remember balance. Two feet on the ground are unshaken; two feet on the rungs of a ladder are unsteady whether they move up or down.’”

“What?” I said.

Miss Ochiba read it again. I still didn’t understand it, but it didn’t sound too bad, especially the part about “for good or ill.” I said so, and Miss Ochiba smiled again. “The Cathayans think that both people and magic are too complex to be summed up clearly in a few words, so the fewer words they use, the more ambiguous they are.”

I thought about that for a minute. “What about Aphrikan magic?”

“That is too difficult to explain in one short afternoon,” Miss Ochiba said, “and I have lessons to prepare. If you will come again tomorrow, however, I shall be happy to teach you as much as you wish to know, within my own knowledge.”

“Yes, please, Miss Ochiba,” I said.

And that was how I started getting my own extra magic lessons.