Eagles and Swans
Chapter 8: Arcane/Ordinary
Preface 02: Learning Hate
It was first said by philosopher Elode Iris at the Opening of Gates that flight was the one true expression of Ihir's benevolence. It was from the blood of the Father of Freedom that all birds had taken form; their songs and cries were their exultations.
To the people who had made His nests their home, he gave the Threads, on which His kingdom hung, so that they too may fly as He did. He asked nothing but love in return, though love, in the eyes of all the gods, is synonymous to obligation.
The Threads lifted the people out of drudgery in mud and stone, turning labour and toil into a distant memory. But these Threads shifted in the wind, sturdy on some days and frail on others, and when they snapped, they flung people to their deaths.
The people grew certain the power of the Threads ebbed and flowed with their devotion and servitude, and that death by fall was merely punishment for wavering. So they loved Ihir ever deeper, for He had raised them from the mud, and flight was His to give and take.
They constructed monuments to His name, vast floating chambers where the Threads hummed with power, where one could walk without touching the ground and ornaments could be suspended in the air, gifts to their god. They knelt three hours a day beneath the sky with their eyes cast upward, crying out for His blessing, and they scrubbed grime from the granite once every three days. Those who failed their duties were cast out to walk in the mud, and if ever they were seen flying, they were castigated, or stones were thrown at them.
Years became centuries, and routines became traditions. Traditions were inherited without the knowledge of why they were performed. As the buildings lost their foundations, so did their rituals, and there came doubt. Some lived without prayer. Some sang the praises of other deities instead.
The people remembered that this was sin, though they had begun to forget why, and they cast the doubters out onto the mud, as they always had. The sky continued to be theirs, and they thanked Ihir for it every day.
Light glowed through arches of the Central Circle School. The wind could not diffuse the heat, upon which the first scent of plum blossoms floated. The sun set the desks aflame, long shadows falling at their feet.
Today the class sat perfectly still, Ms. Kelde in her shimmering gown squinting as if she might spring like a snake at the slightest provocation. Ruthenia herself was more absorbed in erasing her notebook doodles than in anything she had to say on the subject of Etiquette (or, Pretending To Be An Well-Bred For Your Personal Benefit).
The classroom still stood divided down the middle, the Arcane on the left and the ordinary on the right. She intermittently watched her classmates—Vesta shaking herself awake every few minutes, Dariano struggling to keep his back as straight only to be prodded by Ms. Kelde's cane, and Orrem clenching his fists under his desk, as if he would punch the teacher if that wouldn’t immediately land him an expulsion and ruin his racing career.
The moment the clock-tower began to chime and Ms. Kelde left the room with a clicking of heels, it was as if a cork had been loosened, and everyone spilled over with suppressed conversation. Ruthenia sprawled herself out on her tabletop, yawning as she stretched. She glared down at Tanio’s beef patty before stuffing it all in her mouth.
Mr. Caldero shuffled in as the three-thirty bell chimed to mark the end of the break. He straightened his coat. “Assignments?” he announced, rapping the board with his knuckles. The air grew thick with rustles as everyone else began pulling ruled sheets of finished essays from their bags. Ruthenia found her own, shrugged, and passed it down the row, along with everyone else’s.
“Good essay,” said Alacero as it entered his hands, and she heard many successive bouts of giggling as the piece of paper made its way down.
Mr. Caldero riffled through his own copy of The Legend of Helika Laceld while the essay pile grew on his table. He gave the class a minute to finish, before finally picking up a stick of chalk and writing three words on the board: “Chapter Seven symbolism”.
That was exactly what he spent the next twenty minutes describing in grotesque detail. Amid his ramble about butterflies and mayflies, Ruthenia laid her head on her arms and closed her eyes, drifts of his monologue skimming her consciousness every now and then.
“Psst, this could be useful,” whispered Calan from her right.
“Literature isn't useful.” She let her head drop back to the table.
“Now,” concluded the man, beginning to scrub text from the blackboard, “I would like each of you to spend the next ten minutes writing a paragraph about the use of symbolism in this chapter.”
The scribbling of pencils swept all conversation away. Ruthenia sighed, then picked up her own pencil and a scrap of paper. She stared at her sheet, shrugged and began writing.
Ten minutes elapsed. Caldero gestured for them to stop, and there was a clatter of numerous pencils meeting desks.
The professor’s eyes crossed the classroom, pausing on each member of the notorious middle row in turn, until they came upon Ruthenia herself.
“Miss Cendina,” he said. “Would you read your answer to the class?”
Ruthenia glanced down at her sheet, then back at the teacher. “Me?” she said, pointing at herself.
“I am sure we can all learn from your answer, whatever it be.”
She rolled her eyes. “Sure. Hmm.” She squinted exaggerated at the page. “‘An analysis of the symbolism of insects. Insects are mentioned in the story.’”
Mr Caldero raised a wrinkled hand. “Do not state the obvious,” he said, and was answered with laughter. “Carry on.”
“That’s all I have.”
“That’s all you have? ‘Insects are mentioned’? That is not an analysis.”
“Well, too bad. I haven't read the book.”
The Literature teacher heaved a sigh. “Sit.” She knew what was coming, when he turned to the other side of the classroom and pointed at his pet student. “Mister Luzerno, could you give us a critique of Miss Cendina’s response?”
“Certainly, but I do not know where to begin,” the aforementioned Arcane Prince replied. A gust of giggling swept across the room. “I'm surprised she got as far as spelling the words right.”
As laughter roared, Ruthenia felt her face blaze. She only barely held herself in her seat, and rather than throw a desk, she fumed silently at her desk.
Mr. Caldero was unmistakeably smirking, too. “Now, could you read us your answer?” he said.
Clearing his throat, Aleigh lifted his sheet. “‘In The Legend of Helika Laceld, entomological symbols are a recurrent motif particularly centring on two: the mayfly and the dragonfly. The two species are plied as morphologically similar species that nevertheless exhibit highly different behaviour. This entomological refrain culminates in Chapter Seven,’” he read. “‘The first of these insects, the mayfly, appears wherever death is foreshadowed; one ‘lands upon Helika's arm’ as she speaks to Candle—’”
“Excellent, excellent,” Caldero cut in. “Why don’t you write the paragraph on the board so we may study and critique it? You in particular, Miss Cendina. Take your head off your desk.”
“Gladly.” He cast Ruthenia a glare. At the board, he began his paragraph in the same meticulous cursive that she'd come to recognise, the loops of f's drawn the opposite way from what you'd expect. She grimaced and stuck out her tongue at his back.
*
As the class drew to its close, the room was consumed by a melange of chatter and paper-shuffling enveloped by the chime of the clock tower. With the steady trickle of students into the hallway, the classroom grew quieter.
Ruthenia stopped by the door with as foul a grimace as she could manage. She watched, through the bustle of gossip and dinner plans, as Aleigh stacked his books on his desk.
He made no sign of having seen her—but once as he made for the exit, he met her eye in full earnest for the first time since she had accepted his job.
As he passed, she stuck out a hand to halt him.
The Arcane Prince regarded her hand for a while. “Excuse me,” he said, making to circumnavigate it.
“Hey, look here!” she snapped. “What was all that about? Why are you being like this after I helped you?”
He narrowed her eyes at her. “I must be on my way, goodbye.” Without so much as another glance, he strode out the door.
“Hey—come back!” Flying out the doorway, through the golden light, Ruthenia intercepted Aleigh midway down the corridor. “I just saved you-know-who! And you repay me by making fun of my spelling skills?”
“Just as you mocked me a week ago. That is only fair, no?” He shifted his briefcase to his other hand.
Ruthenia balled her fists. “Oh, so the Arcane Prince wants to lecture me about who's allowed to mock whom.”
He sighed. “This was a mistake,” he said. “We should never have talked.”
Her lips curled into a grimace. “I can see why you have no friends.”
“I do not seek friends.”
Without another word, Aleigh strode right past her, and Ruthenia turned a little too late, mouth open for a retort that never came. She snarled, took her umbrella in hand, and marched off towards the exit on her own.