The Legend of the Meta-Defying Smith Who Saved the Kingdom

The Smith had had, practically, a perfect day. He had managed to walk unescorted to the Enchanter's Guild, attended a class on Enchanting, learned much, met the love of his life, made new friends who were also Enchanters, managed to walk home unescorted without incident, and had learned the proper way to court a woman of Isabella's station.

The Enchantress' day had been an exercise in frustration.

The day had started out well enough: she woke and took her breakfast in the Izguardia manor and spent the morning doing her mana control exercises in the garden. After a light lunch taken in her favorite gazebo, she was escorted through the city streets to the Enchanter's Guild—a collection of buildings and short towers in a tiny plaza set apart from the rest of the buildings on the street. She spoke with the doorman, and a maid took over her escort, bringing her to the classroom. All fine.

But then for some reason, all her classmates were upset with her!

Obviously she would need a seat in the front row: she was the daughter of a noble, daughter of the head of the Izguardia family, and she was a petite young woman! How could she see if she sat behind one of those large young men? Even the other girl in the class was taller than she herself was, though she wouldn't be so uncouth as to make her sit in the back row either.

Really, one of the men should have offered his seat to her in the first place.

So she chose the most distinctive of them and gently encouraged him to yield her his seat.

And then everyone got mad! Even though the poor foreigner had appeared to have a speech impediment, he had understood what she meant and yielded his seat promptly. She had thought it was fine, but then the other girl had started to scold her, and then the maid had betrayed her, and even the foreigner boy had made some kind of insinuation about her!

A pretty poor start, certainly. But not irrecoverable. They would be classmates for the next two weeks. She would simply perform well in the course and over time her classmates would come to understand her better, and they could at least be cordial colleagues, if not friends.

Isabella's heart sank when the teacher announced that the blonde foreigner was a Knight's retainer.

How was she supposed to know that?! His cloak was unmarked!

Then the humiliation of being asked a simple question and being unable to answer. Not that the red-head boy's answer—she supposed she should start practicing their names now, Ewan—he had been able to at least give an answer, even if it wasn't fully correct.

Frustration turned to sadness and self-doubt at some point as they continued.

She knew some of the material already. Her father had hired a tutor for her from one of the enchanting workshops with which their trading company did business, so she knew about things like the elements and such even if she couldn't draw the runes perfectly yet. The tutor had assured her that once she got a boost in dexterity from one or both of her Classes, she would find it easy.

The problem was that the teacher, Enchanter Melinda, had moved so fast. It was like trying to drink from an entire jug of water all at once without spilling. Utterly impossible.

At the end, she felt like her head was overheating, even as she forced herself to remain upright and confident, as befit a woman of her station.

"...Isabella, stay behind."

And then the confidence crumbled.

She was being singled out. All the other students left, and the blonde one, James, was the last to leave after he returned some book to the cabinet in the back. As class had gone on, it became clear that he didn't really have some speech impediment: his answers weren't always correct, but when they were, they were insightful on a level that had even gotten a reaction out of the teacher. Did he know so much because he was a foreigner? Or was it because he was a Knight's retainer?

He left, and Isabella was alone with the teacher. She clenched her hands in her lap, and looked past the swell of her chest down at the wood grain of her desk, prepared for a scolding. A scraping noise made her twitch, but it was the teacher pulling a chair over to sit across the little desk from her.

"Miss Isabella, are you alright?"

The tone was kind and concerned. Isabella blinked the moisture from her eyes and looked up.

The senior Enchanter was leaning forward to peer into Isabella's eyes, her face expressing nothing but concern.

And then that expression turned professional again in an instant.

"Good, I see that you are."

Isabella's mouth fell open, perturbed.

"Now, were you able to keep up with the material? I was told that you insisted you would be able to complete the course, even unclassed for the majority of the time, but the course is designed for students who already have an Enchanter or Mage Class. I can only imagine that looking at the enchantment design, it must appear to be meaningless shapes and squiggles.

Isabella's eyes flicked to the blackboard, where indeed there were a bunch of meaningless shapes and squiggles. They were reproduced as best she had been able in her own notes.

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"I… I can keep up. I will keep up with the course, Enchanter Melinda!" Isabella raised her chin, forcing herself to at least display the confidence she didn't always feel.

"Good. I won't be slowing down, then."

Wait, that had been an option?!

But it was too late; Melinda barreled on like a boulder rolling down a hill.

"Now, come with me." The senior Enchanter stood, and Isabella hurried to put her notes in her bag and grab her parasol, lest the harsh early summer sun mar her delicate skin.

They walked down the stairs together, and past the rest of her classmates sharing tea at one of the tables. The girl, Raven, gave her a rather nasty look, while Ewan and Ricardo—must remember to call him Ricardo—merely glanced at her before returning to their conversation. The retainer, James, he looked her up and down slightly more, but Melinda continued with long strides that Isabella was struggling to keep up with, and before she knew it, they were out the door and in the plaza.

She could have really gone for some tea, just then.

Instead, her escorts Tomás and Geraldo met up with them, and Melinda showed them to the fountain in the center of the plaza.

"The easiest first step to becoming sensitive to magic, even before you get your class, is to become able to detect essence. The water in this fountain is saturated with undine essence. Feel free to study here in your free time, when the Guild is open."

Just as she finished speaking, a soft chime rang out from one of the towers.

"And now the Guild is closing. Good evening, Miss Isabella."

"G-good evening to you, too!" Isabella barely managed to respond as Melinda turned on her heel and strode out of the Guild plaza even before the chimes' echoes fully faded.

"Did you have a good day of lessons, Miss Isabella?" Geraldo, the shield-bearer, asked.

"Quiet, I need to study the fountain water."

"Heh, she's already becoming like one of them Mages," Tomás chuckled at the barely coherent reply. Mages tended to say stuff like that, in his experience. It was best to just nod along.

A minute later, three young men and a young woman passed by, roughly the young mistress' age. None approached, however, and they were quickly on their way. And several minutes after that, a steady stream of older men and women passed them, until finally an older gentleman wearing gold-rimmed glasses called out to them.

"The Guild is closing, young miss."

At this, the young mistress stopped glaring at the water and stood up straight. "Oh, Enchanter Xavier. Of course." She looked at her escorts. "Let us be on our way, I have much to study tonight."

Once back at the manor, inside the walls, Tomás and Geraldo breathed a sigh of relief. Their charge was drawing more and more attention by the day as she grew more and more beautiful. For now, there was little risk of abduction, but her Choosing Day was rapidly approaching, and then the risks would drastically increase.

The worst would be the political risks, but the two guards knew that was beyond their ability to control. That would be up to Baronet Izguardia.

Isabella bid farewell and a good evening to her escorts, as she always did—courtesy was important, after all—and prepared herself for dinner with her parents and whichever of her older siblings came over today.

Unfortunately for her, it was just her and her parents this evening.

At first, her father was pleased.

"Oh, the Enchanter Xavier sends his regards! Most wonderful. I will have to see if I can get on his schedule as soon as possible."

Wait, had the doorman been someone important? Isabella bit her lip softly, then stopped once she noticed that her mother had noticed.

Then came the criticisms.

She had greeted everyone wrong.

She had asked for a seat in the front row wrong.

She should have known to just say 'I don't know' to a silly question like 'what is magic.'

Her father actually became upset when she told him the blonde boy, James, was a Knight's retainer.

"You did what?" he had demanded.

But her mother had saved her. She even found it amusing, because she giggled.

"No, Isabella, he doesn't have some kind of speech impediment. And I doubt he was trying to insult you when he said you were 'like that,' either. Who knows? Perhaps he was talking about your height after all? Still, this is why introductions are so important: if you had paused to let them introduce themselves, you would have known to be properly courteous."

Her father had more to say, but after getting a look from her mother, he had paused unnaturally and grown thoughtful. Finally, he sighed. "Our daughter really is growing up fast, isn't she?"

The rest of dinner was less criticisms and more embarrassing stories from when she was younger. Unpleasant, but better than a scolding.

After-dinner tea ended with a short discussion of the Knight's retainer: his name, which Knight he was retainer to, and everything she could remember about him; apparently, he was going to be investigated. Her mother had asked a different sort of questions: how he looked, whether Isabella found him handsome or not, what shade of blonde his hair was, his eye color, the roughness or softness of his hands, and on and on. It had only stopped when Isabella pointedly reminded her mother that James sat behind her in class, so she wasn't looking at him all the time. Her mother had giggled at that and her father had a look on his face like he'd swallowed a bug.

She didn't have time for this, she needed to study!

Finally she was dismissed from the table and, wondering if this was how Enchanter Melinda felt all the time and why she was always in a hurry, rushed to her bedroom to review her notes from the day's lecture.

The next morning she woke, ate an early breakfast, and hurried to the Enchanter's Guild, arriving just as the dawn light touched the highest spire of the Royal Castle. She forced herself to walk gracefully to the fountain, and then…

Nothing.

It was just water. Was Melinda trying to trick her? She looked at it from every angle, but nothing stood out.

"Ahem, uh, g-good morning, Miss Isabella." A voice called out from behind her, along with the faint jingle of metal.