First Witch's Tale

Perhaps he thinks I failed, I thought, as I woke up the following morning. The gods know I wasn’t trained in debate.

The tutors, I decided after breakfast, had found a new way to torture students. The exams were largely over, but there were no hints of who had passed and who had failed. Most of my peers decided to head down to town, to lose themselves in drink and debauchery; I stayed behind, if only because it wasn’t something I felt comfortable doing. I had seen too many men - and a few women - turn into monsters, after drinking themselves silly, for me to risk getting drunk myself. Cemburu didn’t go down to town either. I saw him walk into the forest and vanish into the trees. I was tempted to follow him, but I had better things to do. I went back to the practice chambers and started revising my spells. Even if I failed the exam, I told myself, I had still made incredible progress.

It wasn’t until the following morning that we finally got our results - and I realised why Cemburu had been so pleased with himself. He had passed! More than that, I noted sourly; he had passed with flying colours. The ranking system was simple, very easy to understand. As impossible as it was to believe, Cemburu had done better than me and everyone else in the class. I couldn’t believe it!

I was still goggling at the ranking when I felt a hard swat on my bottom. “I beat you,” Cemburu jeered. “I beat you! I beat everyone!”

My wand was in my hand a second later. “Do you want me to kick your arse in front of everyone again?”

Cemburu’s smile grew wider. “Do you think you can?”

I glared. I knew I had come close to losing the challenge. I would have lost if he hadn’t made a tiny, but fatal, mistake. I had practised more since then, and gone through every last step of the duel with Master Falladine, yet I wasn’t wholly confident of victory. I wanted to knock him down hard, with all the magic I could muster, but … I couldn’t take the thought of becoming the class outcast again. I tried to tell myself that I should be happy for him, that I should be impressed yet done so well, but …

It grew worse, as classes resumed. Cemburu was practically a different person. He jumped ahead by leaps and bounds, putting together spells in ways I hadn’t thought possible. I had no idea how he was doing it. I hadn’t fallen down all the way to the bottom, not again, but Cemburu was catching up. The question nagged at me - how was he doing it? Had he found a tutor? There was no rule against it or he would have cited it when he had realised Master Falladine had been giving me private lessons. Or … or what?

His behaviour didn’t improve either. He made snide remarks to me that brought me to inches of hitting him again, or challenging him to a second duel, all the while being cheeky and disrespectful to the tutors. I wondered if he was insane. The tutors would have no trouble dealing with him if he pushed them too far. I didn’t think anyone would go out of his way to get a thrashing and yet … Cemburu seem to be doing just that. The other boys noticed something was wrong - and boys, in my experience, were incredibly obtuse when it came to such things. Cemburu might be working his way back up to the top, but his former cronies had not gone back to him. The rest of the boys kept their distance too. It was … weird. They had welcomed me as one of them, when I had proved myself, but not Cemburu. I didn’t pretend to understand it.

I kept a wary eye on him as he swanned around the school. His behaviour was bizarre. He would talk to some of the tutors as an equal, all the while pushing the younger students around. He had the right to tell the juniors to fetch and carry for him, as had I, but he took it too far. I didn’t know if they were allowed to complain - I haven’t, when I had been a junior - yet I thought it was just a matter of time before he crossed the line. I couldn’t understand why the staff hadn’t done anything. It was one thing to make the juniors work, but quite another to push them into doing things they really shouldn’t. I wrestled with my conscience. I didn’t want a reputation as a tattletale, or a sneak, but this was going too far. Perhaps I could have a quiet word with Master Falladine, ask him if he had noticed something. Or …

But no one would ever trust me again, I thought. It was a bitter realisation. Being alone would be a thousand times worse, now that I had had the experience of having friends and peers. If I tell the staff …

I didn’t. I couldn’t. But when I saw Cemburu going into the woods, again, I followed.

Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven