He told no one of his dream. In his thoughts, the fire and his last Midwinter gift were tangled up together in a way he couldn't explain. At first slept with his painted horse beneath his pillow, but he got into such terrible fights with the other boys when they tried to take it away from him that at last the Master of Boys said he would keep the toy safe for Elidor in his own office, where Elidor could visit it whenever he wished.
The weeks passed, then the months, then the years, and no Companion came, and slowly, rebelliously, Elidor settled into the routine of the Library and its school. First he worked as a runner, delivering messages between the offices of the great library, then as a page, reshelving books and bringing volumes when they were asked for. Along with the other children sent to Talastyre to learn-to Elidor's astonishment, most of them had families (his uncle had been telling the truth when he said he had secured for Elidor an enviable position)-Elidor was taught to read and write: his first lessons were in the Common Tongue and to scribe a simple fair hand, but they would be followed by courses in other, older languages and the clear difficult copyist's hand. That training would be the work of years, for it took decades to make a fully-trained Scribe. Not everyone completed it. Some lacked the aptitude. Others were there only to learn the basic lessons before returning to their families, or passing on to other training.
Elidor hated and envied them, while clinging to his secret hope: that he would be Chosen, that he would be more special, more loved than all of them, in the end. He made no friends, and wanted none, and the work he could not avoid, he did grudgingly, and only if watched.
Literacy was Elidor's salvation.
"Here is something that might interest you," the Master of Boys said. He sat down beside Elidor-who was being detained, as punishment, while the other boys were sent out to play in the spring sunshine-and set a book upon the desk. It was large, bound in blue leather, stamped in silver.
Elidor hated everything about books-the way they looked, the way they smelled, their weight, their pages filled with incomprehensible symbols. He turned his head away. But the Master of Boys didn't seem to notice. He simply opened the book.
A flash of color drew Elidor's attention, and he looked. There, painted on the page, was a brightly-colored painting of a Companion and its Herald. Every detail was clear, and in the spring sunlight, the silver bells on the Companions harness shone like stars.
Elidor grabbed for it, but the Master of Boys drew it back.
"Are your hands clean?" he asked gently.
Elidor inspected his palms. They were gray with the slate of the pencils the boys had been using to practice their letters.
"Go and wash them, then."
Elidor hurried to the back of the room and rinsed his hands quickly in the basin there, leaving most of the dirt on the towel. But his hands were clean when he returned. He held them out for inspection.
The Master of Boys passed him the book.
Quickly-and carefully, as he had been taught-Elidor turned the pages. But there were not many pictures, though many of the pages had a large bright initial letter, each one in Herald blue, some with a tiny picture of a Companion twined around it.
"It is a great pity you cannot read this," the Master of Boys said thoughtfully, "for it contains many tales of the Companions and their brave Heralds." He gently drew the book away from Elidor and closed it. "There are other such books in our Library. Perhaps someday you will be able to read them, if you apply yourself to your lessons."
From that day Elidor worked hard at his lessons, and harder at any task that brought him among the books. Soon he could read as well as many of the older boys, and when two more years had passed, the Master of Boys made good on his promise, and Elidor was given a pass that allowed him free access to any book on the open shelves of the library.
At first he was only interested in works about the Heralds and the Companions, their history and their deeds, but as the years passed and he had run through all of those, his interests broadened until a book's subject hardly mattered. All of Elidor's adventures were lived through books, and most of the time he was resigned to the fact that this was how it would always be. His friends were the books of the Great Library, and his teachers spoke approvingly of his abilities. Elidor, they said, will be a Master Copyist someday, and a great credit to our training.
But deep inside, the unacknowledged spark of resentment at how Life had cheated him still burned dully, and the hope remained, grown faint and dim with the passing of years, that a Companion would come to make his life magical.
* * *
In the town square, the play was getting to the part that he liked best, and unconsciously Elidor rose up on tip-toes, trying to see better.
There was a jingle of bells onstage, as the actor dressed as the Companion appeared from the wings. The horselike body was woven of light wicker covered with white velvet, and its flashing eyes were made of bright foil-backed blue glass. Slowly the Companion danced forward, pausing in turn before the Raggedy Woodman, the Greedy Tax-Collector, and the Karsian Wizard before stopping at last at the feet of Hob the Orphan Boy.
Something soft and moist touched Elidor on the back of the neck.
He turned and stared, only dimly realizing that everyone else was staring too.
It was a Companion, real and live and in the flesh, no more like a horse than the carved wooden toy of his childhood was. Its coat was white, almost more like duck down than horsehair, and from its blue eyes shone such a sense of calm majesty that Elidor nearly wanted to weep.
It was so close to the moment he'd dreamed of all his life that it seemed unreal, as if he ought to be reading about it, not living it. A Companion had come for him at last!
But somehow it didn't seem right. All the stories agreed that the candidates knew when they'd been Chosen, though the stories never managed to describe the feeling. He reached out a hand to stroke that downy muzzle, and the Companion took a step backward, still watching him with grave, wise eyes.
He wants me to follow, Elidor realized. He nodded, not really sure if the Companion could understand, and took a step forward.
Immediately the Companion turned, and took several steps away, and waited, almost fidgeting. He hadn't known something in the shape of a horse could fidget, but there it was.
"You!" Elidor said to the nearest boy. "Go and tell them at the Library that a Companion has come!" He didn't know what else to say, but surely that would be enough? Then he hurried off after the Companion, trotting to keep up with it. He realized he felt no impulse to even try to mount the stallion, and that, too, wasn't as things went in the stories.
Some of the townsfolk followed them-at a prudent distance-as far as the edge of the town, but it became obvious that the Companion's destination lay further, and Elidor began to wonder if he was going to have to walk all the way to the Collegium. As they left the shelter of the buildings and passed through the town gate that stood open from dawn to sunset, the winter wind struck with renewed chill. He pulled his cloak-dark red, with the arms of the Library of Talastyre sewn in a badge at his left shoulder, as befit a Journeyman such as himself-tighter, and hurried even faster to keep up with the Companion.