The little motor of her impatience revved now as Nell surveyed the school that the Shepherdess had heralded with such enthusiasm. She took note of the ways it failed to live up to expectation. First and most important, it was not in the small upper room in the third band, where even now Max studied under the warm gaze of the honey-voiced old man. It was not in the third band at all, but mostly set in a series of rooms off the great library, two floors up from the dining halls and kitchens and overlooking the first garden. It did carry a pleasing whiff of the old books that permeated the entire first band, but then, so did her bedroom.
Second was the dismaying realization that the Shepherdess took frequent charge of Nell’s level, and so accompanied her into the room, fairly bouncing, to introduce her to the ten other girls of her group. Third, and worst of all, was the lesson itself. Mistress Meva spent the hour or so before dinner telling them stories of mothers who made scholars of their sons when they were but infants, and tracing the routes of young men who said good-bye to their brides to travel to the great academies of Ganbihar from across the sea. The final moments of the day were spent reciting the chant of seeds aloud, a pretty but meaningless poem as far as Nell could see. By the time they were released to sit in the first garden beneath a wide willow, Nell felt frayed and edgy, wishing she could find the loose end of the thread that wound around her so tight she thought she’d burst.
The only thing of real interest in that first hour of school had been two girls her age — Wista and Zirri — who didn’t look like the others. They seemed neither city nor sanctuary, for in their faces the ferocious profile of the Domain had softened — their jaws were narrower, their eyes wider set. But while parts of their skin were as smooth as her own, along the ridge of forehead and cheekbone, Nell could see a thin coat of hair, so light it was shadow.
She stared at the girls too long. Wista’s light-brown hair lay in wisps that puffed out on either side of her round face, and her skin was freckling beneath the disappearing growth. Between her thick fingers, she twisted a copper pendant she wore around her neck, and she gazed at Nell longingly. Nell flushed in sympathy. The other girl, black-haired Zirri, regarded her out of dark-gray eyes with a look that made the hair on Nell’s neck stand up.
On their way out to the garden, Minna, a vivid redhead whose nose was liberally peeling from a sunburn, explained quietly that Wista and Zirri were halfway through “the return” — the process by which newcomers shed the change after they’d come from the outside.
“Where’d you wait yours out?” Minna asked her, rubbing her nose so vigorously a little snow shower of peeling skin flew from it. “Never seen anybody come like you. I heard the Master Watcher himself brought you in. Did he stay with you out there? Help you for a long time?”
Minna claimed a prime spot for her beneath the willow, pulled a sandwich left over from lunch out of her pocket, and offered to share. Wista accepted half gratefully. From where they sat, the group of them had a good view of the younger girls trooping along the paths behind their pretty teachers, or playing in the flower beds. The air was thick and smelled of roses, some of which climbed the wall of the first band and wound themselves around the edges of the white stones. Nell noticed that anyone over the age of ten was happy to sprawl lazily on benches or grass, breathing in the evening’s perfume. She wished fleetingly that she felt like joining them, but at mention of the Master Watcher, the thread of impatience snagged inside Nell, and she shook her head.
“No, we just met him.”
The others stared at her.
“But you’re changed!” Wista said. “How else?”
Nell realized her mistake a moment too late. She shrugged. “Oh. We spent some time in the woods.”
Zirri glanced at her out of the corner of her storm cloud eyes. “We all did that,” she said. “But without the training, you don’t start until you get here.”
“The training?”
Wista motioned to the first band. “School.”
Nell wondered how school could change anything. Besides, they had schools in the city, and that didn’t seem to help.
“What does school have to do with it?” she asked.
Zirri snorted. “What do you think makes the change? I don’t see how you look like you do without knowing that.”
Nell caught the words before they were out of her mouth this time. In the silence that followed, two white moths fluttered down from the willow leaves, a handful of sparrows landed to gather the crumbs of Wista’s sandwich, and some distance away, a group of girls that included Jean moved among the flowers, singing.
Wista said, “I think she means that it’s different here, the way they teach us. I’m not sure how, exactly, but they say that the longer you’re here, the more it sticks.”
Nell wondered what other nonsense they taught in this school.
“That’s nice,” she said, trying to be diplomatic. “But when do we learn to do things?”
“Do things?” Wista asked.
“You know. Make things. Like the mist up there.”
They stared at her, and Zirri broke out laughing, sending the sparrows into flight.
“Who do you think you are?” she laughed. “The Guide himself?”
Nell flushed. She wasn’t sure what mistake she’d made now, but she could tell by the looks on their faces that it was a good-sized one.
“Is that very advanced?” she asked carefully.
Zirri laughed louder this
