Chapter 93 - 94
"It’s just a small thing."
"To master such a skill in just a few short months is nothing to scoff at. I’m very proud of you."
He wondered what his uncle would think if he knew that Alistar had mastered the spell within two weeks, and had since gone on to study other spellwork. Uncle needs to take a break from his duties. Maybe I should ask him to spend a day with Anne and I?
Caedmon was dressed in a similar outfit to his own, though his uncle’s included a silver circlet atop his long-haired head as well as a shiny pocket watch of the same shade. The chain of this watch was fastened to one of the many polished buttons of his sable tunic, leaving a hanging string of silver between the button and his breast pocket. There were deep bags below his eyes, as well as a few stress lines that hadn’t been there in recent years.
"How are you holding up? Not too nervous, I hope?"
He could tell that his uncle was the nervous one, but he saw no sense in pointing this out. Instead, he said, "Not nervous, but a bit uncomfortable." Looking down at his clothes for a moment, he added, "I can’t wait to change out of this outfit for today’s practice."
"Practice? You won’t be having practice for the next five days, unfortunately. Tramon didn’t say anything?"
Alistar recalled the conversation that he’d had with his master about his curriculum for this week. Tramon had said that, under no circumstances short of death itself was he to miss one of his classes during this time, and if any of his uncles had a problem with this then they could come take him back by force. Having sensed that the old sword master would have liked nothing more than for such a development to occur, Alistar had simply assured him that he would attend the lessons as usual and had forgotten about it up until this moment.
"I don’t think Master will like that..."