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::Wake up, layabout!::

Mags came awake all at once, the legacy of the years when you woke just before the kick came, so you could roll out of the way and pop up on your feet. ::Wha—hey?:: he replied, sitting straight up in bed and swinging his legs over to the floor before he was able to form a coherent thought. ::Whut’s th’ ’mergency?::

::No emergency. Rolan just told me what you and Nikolas will be doing. He and Nikolas want you to be thinking about what you believe you’ll need, based on when you were playing the blind beggar down in Haven. He’s already got an identity as a fellow who deals openly in second-hand goods, who is secretly something they call a “fence.” That’s someone who takes in stolen goods and gets rid of them where no one knows they’re stolen, or sells them in turn to someone who’ll take them so far away the theft won’t be known. You’ll be his son.::

::Tell ’im I reckin I should be deef,:: he answered promptly. ::I be good at holdin’ m’tongue, an’ I kin make whatever signs an’ Mindspeak whut I’m s’posed t’hev said straight to ’im. An people’ll talk free ’round me, thinkin’ I cain’t hear ’em.::

::I’ll tell them. If you can think of anything else, tell me. Nikolas wants to start tonight. These fence people usually don’t work until after the sun goes down.::

Huh. Takin’ in stolen stuff. Guess thet’ll be whut brings Guards an’ Constables, an’ I reckon we’ll be passin’ ’em whut we learn. Mebbe they’ll be passin’ whut they do. It sounded as if he was going to be doing without sleep for a while. Well, worse things had happened than a little lost sleep.

He washed up and pulled on his uniform. Nikolas hadn’t said anything about skipping classes. ::Heyla, Dallen. ’Mind Nikolas thet I knows sparklies. Thet’d be th’ reason for why ’e keeps me ‘’bout.::

::Oh! Good idea.::

He began mentally calculating what it was going to take to pull this off. Fortunately that exhibition game of Kirball was the last the teams would play this season. It was just too hot to play in that open field in all the armor and padding. Practice and games would resume in the fall, when it was cooler.

::And Herald Caelen wants to see you about your class schedule.::

::Now?:: he asked in surprise.

::After breakfast.::

Well, that was interesting. Perhaps he had better postpone making plans until after he heard what Caelen had in store for him.

Back at the mines, he’d loved and hated summer in equal measure. Hated it, because the longer days meant longer work. Loved it, because at least he wasn’t freezing all the time, when he could snatch a free moment there were things you could eat to be grubbed up out of the woods, fields, and stream, and because even he, miserable creature that he had been, was able to see the breathtaking beauty in a summer morning.

Now he was well fed, healthy, and—yes—happy. And a walk up from Companion’s Stable to the dining hall on a perfect summer morning was enough to make him want to sing. Not that he would. He would never shatter the quiet, full of birdsong and the scent of fresh grass and the flowers up in the gardens, with something that sounded like a mule in pain. There were many things that Mags knew he did well. Singing was definitely not one of them.

The Waking Bell rang as he reached the dining hall, but breakfast began there before the bell sounded. Plenty of people other than the Trainees ate here, and many of them started their day at dawn. He was, as usual, one of the first in the hall; he sat down at an empty table and ate neatly and quickly. Whatever it was that Caelen wanted to tell him, it had to be important, or he would never have had Dallen relay the order to him at a moment when most of the Trainees weren’t even up yet.

He never ate so quickly that he wolfed down his food without tasting it, however. He had gone for so long eating what most of the folk in this building would consider not even fit for pigs that he never missed an opportunity to actually savor what he ate. And give a little silent thanks that he was getting it in the first place.

Just as the first of the Trainees began to trickle in, looking a bit rumpled and still sleepy, he was finished. He took his dishes to the hatch and ran down the hall and up the stairs to Caelan’s office. The door was already standing open, and the Dean was putting away a stack of books. Like Mags, the Dean of Heraldic Collegium began his day early.

“I sometimes wonder if people who lie abed late have any idea what they are missing,” Herald Caelen said conversationally, with a nod to the open window behind his desk. The office was in much better shape than it had been when Mags had first met the Dean. There were only half as many books and papers as had been crammed in here back then, and most of them were properly stowed in cubbys and on the bookshelves that lined the walls.

“Dunno, sir,” Mags responded, and closed the door behind him. “Reckon they’d jest say ’tis same as sunset. On’y i’ th’ East.”

“So they might. Well, sit down, this shouldn’t take long. Nikolas has told me all about his plan and asked me to do what I could to make things easier on you. So I have. I have good news and bad news.” Caelen waited while Mags took a seat, then seated himself. “The bad news is that I simply cannot wave my hand and make the classes you really need to take go away. It’s possible it might take you more years before you are reckoned to be ready for Whites than the rest of your yearmates.”

Mags’ heart sank.

“The good news is—it might not. It’s going to depend on how well you can keep up and what things the Circle ultimately decides that you need not take in order to qualify. And I can do things for the short term at least. Nikolas is fairly certain this little adventure is not going to be needed come the fall, and traditionally in summer we give students a lighter load anyway. So, this is what I’ve done. I’ve postponed some of your classes and moved the rest into a single block of time. So my question is, would you rather sleep from noon until sunset, then join Nikolas in the city, then return here at dawn and take classes in the morning? Or would you rather sleep from early dawn until noon, take your classes, then join Nikolas?”

Oh, now that was a good question. If he had only himself to consider, he would take his lessons in the morning and sleep until nightfall. But he didn’t have just himself to consider. He had friends. And if he did that, he would never see them.

It struck him, then, leaving him a little stunned for a moment. I... hev friends. Real friends. People I wanter see an’ talk to an’ be with... “Afternoon, please ye, sir,” he replied, and laughed. “Reckon I kin get easier used ter eatin’ nuncheon fer breakfast than breakfast fer supper.”

“That’s probably a wise choice,” Caelen replied, making notes. “If nothing happens all night and you end up drowsing, you’ll have a morning to catch up with the others in your lessons. And if you end up working all night, you will be very tired when you get back here. So tiresome of thieves and criminals not to keep regular hours!”

Mags managed a little laugh.

“All right, nothing for you today, you’ll start the new schedule tomorrow. I’m glad Nikolas waited until the start of the quarter before embarking on this; it’s much easier than trying to rejuggle everything after you’d already started.”