Chapter 67. Nudge and Wink
I woke up the next morning. Grit kept nudging me and winking at me all through breakfast. Minnelil pretended she didn’t notice anything even when her face was pink up to her scalp. Fek focused on eating as much as possible. To prepare for the workshop, he said.
Grit looked ready to explode, so I said I’d need to go see the Bursar and escaped out of the Breakfast Hall. Clickens was perched on my shoulder. I hoped it would get along with the Bursar.
“Hey,” I called. “My workshop is finished, so I wondered if you need any help?”
“Approach,” she said. “What is that?”
Before I could answer, Clickens jumped off my shoulder and clacked down on the Bursar’s table. It stretched its back, then sat on its bony haunches to look at her.
The Bursar leaned down to peer at it. Clickens swatted at its own reflection on the shiny metal ball of her head. Its claws rang against the metal and the Bursar flinched away.
“Spiteful,” she said approvingly. She brandished a fist at it, a ball of metal and blades hovering next to its tiny skull. “Do not disturb my papers. Else. I will splinter you.”
Clickens rubbed his head at her knuckles, purring in his way, the metal wire straining and singing.
“Nice to see you two get along. They ran out of bones to reanimate, so I got to do that,” I said, fetching my chair.
“I see. We have reached. Reanimation saturation,” she said. “I had hoped for more. To have accrued. I will make do.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked, sitting down and grabbing Clickens. The cat had looked like it was about to start sharpening its claws on her torso. I lifted the skeleton and turned its eye sockets to look me in the eyes. “I can feel you thinking something stupid. Don’t try her. Save it for Falar.”
She mewed at me.
“Yes. Please,” the Bursar said. Her voice sounded a lot like Clickens’ mewing did. Maybe she had metal wires resonating inside her as well, like some kind of instrument? She pushed a stack of papers over the desk toward me. “I have planned. The preliminary routes. You will tune the details.”
“Sure, I’m free to help now.”
“You are not free. You are employed.” She tapped the pile of papers. They stood on the only spot the table that was bare from the teetering towers of paper. “I have made space. For you to focus.”
I put Clickens down and it jumped promptly onto the table, curling up on top of my pile of papers. I pushed at it, but it screeched at me. “I’ll work on the floor,” I said.
“Seems. The space was not made for you. After all.”
My neck was sore again. I stretched my head to the side, pressing down on my hand. “I put together a retinue for Angbobolalis.”
“Anglhromendiabilis. He bleeds us. Dry. I wish to. See him gone.”
“And also see him return as soon as possible, it seems?” I said. “He has just a week to put things in order to catch the escort back.”
The Bursar puffed out a cloud of steam. “Pfft,” she said. “That will give him months. In Emos.”
“I heard stories about that place in Tenorsbridge. Pretty weird, they said.”
“Very.”
“Right,” I said after a moment as she didn’t continue. “Anything more you need? I could still make it to lunch, if I’m done for now?”
“Leave. I will continue. My toil.”
“You don’t have to make me feel bad leaving you here with it. I can come back afterward?”
“Snort. Out. And take your dead beast with you. It is trying to climb into my chassis.”
I cradled Mr. Clickens as I walked up the stairs toward the Lunch Hall. The wind wafted on my face and now I was sure I smelled it. The nothingness permeating the Academy’s grounds made it hard to notice, but the wind carried the familiar mold. It had been a week since we had made the trip to the mountain. Since Coratorus had said something was waking up there.
The thing had spoken to me, tried to claim me for its own. It hadn’t been the first one to try, but it had come pretty close. Not having to care about anything had sounded good. It still did, but I had things that mattered now, things I didn’t want to let go of. No matter how much the thought frightened me. The entity could go to—
“Student!” someone shrieked.
I startled and Clickens bounced from my arms, jumping into the air.
Jextor leaped toward me, every massive step bringing him closer. I spun around, looking for an escape, but the way down to the ground looked too far to jump and there were people behind me on the stairs. They saw Jextor and stopped to cluster in the middle of the stairs, blocking the way entirely.
“I haven’t seen you since our little excursion!” he shouted. “Congratulations on finishing that challenge a couple of weeks ago. Even I heard about that one!”
The people behind started to back down the stairs, infuriatingly slow.
I turned to follow them, but Jextor lunged forward and grabbed on to my shoulder. “Heading to lunch? So am I! We can discuss your studies. I heard you’ve been impressing my faculty!”
“I’m actually—“
“Is that the cat!” He grabbed at Clickens, but it clawed its way up my chest and over my shoulder. The robe dragged back as Clickens hid itself behind me, hanging on my back with its claws. “Skittish, is it?”
“Not normally,” I muttered, working my fingers between my throat and the collar of the robe.
“Well, we can introduce ourselves to each other while we eat, come on!”
“Is it true some students crammed you into a trashcan once?” I asked.
Jextor sat opposite me in the faculty table. People had thrown themselves off his way as he marched through the hall. He had shaken hands with the few students who hadn’t managed to do it in time. I think one of them had dislocated a thumb. “Haha! So you’ve heard about that? Delightful prank. Almost fell into the furnace. Did you know it connects directly to an active volcano?”
“Never mind about that, how did they make you fit… wait, is there even an active volcano anywhere on the continent?”
“No! You know your geography, it seems!”
I groaned and rubbed at my face. I’d read what books there had been at the orphanage and one of them had been an atlas. The area north of the Academy was an unexplored frozen wasteland and nothing existed further than the ships could sail. Anything that sailed into the fog surrounding the continent was lost for good, never to return. At least that’s what the book had said. Clickens scrathed at my chair and I leaned down to rub its skull.
“Impressive feat, reanimating the skeleton yourself,” Jextor said. “I’m surprised you dared to try it. Not many are that brave.”
I pressed my lips together, glaring at him. “No one told me it could be dangerous.”
“Everything we do is dangerous, girl!” he said, tilting back and laughing. A skeleton walking behind him flinched away, cups rattling on the tray it was carrying. Jextor straightened and squinted at me, face going serious. “I meant only that I wouldn’t blame you if you’d be wary after what happened on our little excursion.”
He had a point. The hall smelled of roasted vegetables and butter, skeletons walking around with plates heaped with food. “I smell the mold in the air again,” I said slowly, mostly to myself.
“Good nose,” Jextor said. “We dealt the entity a blow on that mountain. Enough for us to focus on other things for a moment. But make no mistake, it is pulling itself together. Sooner or later, it will come for us again. Come for you.”
Jextor stared into my eyes, but then a skeleton placed a plate of food before me, leaning between us. Another one brought two large goblets and set them on the table, large enough that I could have fit my fist into one.
“Wine at lunch?” I asked, sniffing the dark red liquid. “If I drink all this, I’m going to pass out.”
“Who discusses serious matters without wine?” Jextor said, lifting the goblet up to his eyes and toasting me with it. “Tomorrow it might be us serving the lunch, so enjoy life today. Eh, student?”
“If I drink all this, I won’t enjoy tomorrow, that’s for sure.” I took a sip and grimaced at the taste and the fumes hitting the back of my nose. “Nice,” I said, shivering.
“Isn’t it?” Jextor said. “My special stock. Anyway, we were talking about the undead monstrosity haunting you.”
“Right,” I said. The wine had made my eyes water, and I put the goblet down. “Everyone seems to be taking it pretty easy, considering that the thing threatens the school as well. Even Coratorus said so.”
“You’ve spoken with the Principal? Where are they every time I need to get some paperwork signed?” he said, sighing. “But yes, we are aware. No one is resting on their laurels, don’t you worry! It’s just that the Bursar has been looking for a reason to enact her plan with the skeletons for a long time, and we all must dance to her tune for the moment.”
“The nearby mountain is full of dead tigers, and you dance to the tune of the accountant?”
“Have you met her?” Jextor said, pointing a fork at me with a carrot on it.
“Well, yes, but still.”
“She works for the betterment of the school, as do we all,” Jextor said, peering at the carrot thoughtfully. “The Academy has weathered many an attack from foes alive and dead. What is one more monster to us? But running out of food, now that would be a tragedy. Do not worry about either. Those are considerations for us in the faculty.”
“But you are all dumbasses,” I muttered.