The Collegium cook, a moon-faced, eternally cheerful man called Mero, had turned up three days ago. The Collegium bells signaling the proper order of the day had resumed when Mero returned. So now, when Skif awoke at the first bell of the day and went down to the kitchen at the bell that signaled breakfast, he would join Kris and the girl Jeri and some of the teachers around a table in the kitchen for a real cooked meal. With so few to cook for, Mero declined help in cooking, but afterward they all pitched in to clean up. Some of Skif's daydreams about food were coming to pass — Mero even made homely oat porridge taste special.
After breakfast came Skif's first appointment of the day. It wasn't exactly a class… especially not this morning.
And this morning, he could hardly eat his breakfast for impatience to get out to the salle, where some of the weapons training was done. He cleared the table by himself so that he could leave quickly.
He ran to the salle, a building that stood apart from the rest of the Collegia, and for good reason, since it needed to be a safe distance from anywhere people might walk, accidentally or on purpose. The Trainees from all three Collegia learned archery, and even some of the Blues, the students who weren't Trainees at all. And some of those archery students were, to be frank, not very good.
Skif, although he had never shot a bow in his life, had proved to be a natural at it, somewhat to his own surprise. Seeing that, Alberich had tried him with something a bit more lethal and less obvious than an arrow. He'd tried him in knife throwing.
Skif had been terrifyingly accurate. Where his eye went, so did whatever was put in his hand. He had no idea where the skill had come from — but at least his ability to fight with a knife, or with the blunted practice swords, was no better than anyone else's.
Alberich had promised something in the way of a surprise for him this morning, and Skif was impatient to see what he meant, as well as impatient to speak with him.
When Skif arrived at the salle, Alberich was throwing a variety of weapons at a target set up on the other side of the room. Alberich was a hair more accurate than Skif, but Alberich's skill came from training, not a natural talent. Nevertheless, Skif watched with admiration as Alberich placed his weapons — knives, sharpened stakes, and small axes — in a neat pattern on the straw-padded target. He didn't interrupt the Weaponsmaster, and Alberich didn't stop until all the implements he'd lined up on a bench behind him were in the target.
The salle, a long, low building with smooth, worn wooden floors, was lit from above by clerestory windows. This was because the walls were taken up with storage cabinets and a few full-length mirrors. For the rest, there wasn't much, just a few benches, some training equipment, and the door to Alberich's office. For all Skif knew, Alberich might even have quarters here, since he hardly ever saw the Weaponsmaster anywhere else.
“So, you come in good time,” Alberich said, as the last of his sharpened stakes slammed into the target. He turned toward Skif, picking up something from the bench where his weapons had been. “Come here, then. Let us see how these suit you.”
“These” proved to be little daggers in sheaths that Alberich strapped to Skif's arms, with the daggers lying along the in side of his arms. Once on, they were hidden by Skif's sleeves, and he flexed his arms experimentally. They weren't at all uncomfortable, and he suspected that with a little practice wearing them, he wouldn't even notice they were there.
“Of my students, only two are, I think, fit to use these,” Alberich said. “Jeri is one. It is you that is the other. Look you — ” He showed Skif the catch that kept each dagger firmly in its sheath — and the near-invisible shake of the wrist that dropped it down into the hand, ready to throw, when the catch was undone.
Skif was thrilled with the new acquisition — what boy wouldn't be? — but unlike most, if not all, of the other Trainees, he had seen men knifed and bleeding and dead. Men — and a woman or two. Even before he left his uncle's tavern, he'd seen death at its most violent. And he knew, bone-deep and blood-deep, that death was what these knives were for. Not target practice, not showing off for one's friends. Death, hidden in a sleeve, small and silent, waiting to be used.
Death was a cold, still face, and blood pooling and clotting on the pavement. Death was floating bloated in the river. Death was ashes and bones in the burned-out hulk of a building.
Death was someone you knew found still and cold, and never coming back. And these little “toy” daggers were death. Not to be treated lightly, or to be played with.
But death was also being able to stop someone from making you dead.
“Can you kill a man?” Alberich asked suddenly, as Skif contemplated the dagger in his hand.
Skif looked up at the Weaponsmaster. As usual, his face was unreadable. “Depends on th' man,” Skif replied soberly. “If you're talkin' in cold blood, I'd a took Jass down like a mad dog, just 'cause he killed m'friends, and I'd'a done it soon as I knew who his master was. In the dark. In the back. An' if somethin' happens, an' his master won't come up on what's due him — mebbe I'd do him, too. If you're talkin' in hot blood, if I was come at myself — someone wantin' me dead — aye, I'd kill him.”
Alberich nodded, as if that was expected. “So. When are you going to display these to your friends?” he prodded. It sounded casual, but it was prodding.
Skif shook his head. “These — they're for serious work. Not for showin' off. 'Less you order me, Master Alberich, I ain't even gonna wear these, 'cept t' practice. That's like balancin' a rock over a door t' see who gets hit.
