“Did you ask for food?” Suzy whispered.
Jeff shushed her. Ushegg was talking to the man.
In the ensuing discussion, Ushegg’s tone went from polite asking to wheedling to begging to arguing. Jeff recognized the progression from any number of conversations he’d had with his parents, from “Can I go see a movie tonight?” to “Can I buy a crossbow?”
The teacher, if that’s who he was, kept saying, “Ri,” before growing exasperated and giving a longer, more heated answer. He pointed to the guards who had now joined them and said something Jeff translated as “What are these guys supposed to do?”
Ushegg wouldn’t relent. He kept at it until finally the man lost his patience and said, “Keru!” throwing up his hands and stalking into the school.
A second later, he spun and pointed at Jeff and then Suzy, his face a thunderhead, and growled something that sounded like a death threat. Trembling, Jeff resolved not to do, touch, or say anything while in the school. As the man stalked away, Ushegg elbowed Jeff playfully in the ribs and grinned.
Shaking his head, Jeff followed him into the building.
There were only a few rooms inside – opposite the one he and the others were now entering was another class, now empty. Judging by the toys and small furniture, it was for a younger group.
The room they entered had no desks or chairs, and the floor was hard wood planks, but otherwise, it looked like a classroom from Earth. There was a small bookshelf on one wall with a dozen books. There was a blackboard – it may have been stone – mounted on the front wall. A single chair stood by a table covered in papers in the corner.
Once the students had settled to the floor, the teacher began to write on the board with a piece of chalk. Jeff wouldn’t have known what the words meant even if he had understood the script, but he watched and listened, hoping to glean something.
The teacher’s lesson was intense. He kept striking the board with the chalk, emphasizing his points, and several times he circled words and drew arrows to other things. The class paid close attention, nodding and making occasional “Ah,” sounds.
After a while, Ushegg interrupted to ask a question, and from his ill-concealed smile and from the teacher’s reaction, Jeff guessed it was something obnoxious. Jeff scooted a few inches away from the boy and stared fixedly at the board.
Qush Yurwush – that’s what Ushegg had called the teacher – continued the lesson for at least half an hour before finally turning from the blackboard and saying, “Yuxz zu jib thia si.”
Qush Yurwush pointed over to the floor along the side of the class, where Jeff saw a line of small slates, like mini-blackboards, propped against the wall. Each had something different written on it.
Students stood and moved to get the slates, but Qush Yurwush stopped them. “Yegu nez,” he said, and pulled out his wand.
The teacher pointed at one of the boards along the wall and began a rhythmic little chant, “Chay Shovuy’z zyoxu, chay Shovuy’z zyoxu, chay Shovuy’z zyoxu, chay...”
From the first word, a distortion emerged from the tip of his wand. It flew across the room at the speed of a paper airplane and hit one of the slates. As it made contact, the board tipped over and began to slide toward the teacher along the thin ribbon of his spell. When it got close to him, it lifted up off the ground, as if he had been reeling it in with a string.
Qush Yurwush caught the board and stopped his chant. Jeff realized his mouth was hanging open, and he closed it.
The teacher returned the slate, then held up a finger for emphasis and said, “Rib ggiquchoshu nox xi nez.” Then he pointed his wand at the slate again and began to chant, “Shovuy’z zyoxu chay, Shovuy’z zyoxu chay, Shovuy’z zyoxu chay...”
This time, no spell emerged from his wand. But as he chanted, Jeff’s attention on Qush Yurwush sharpened and intensified. The other noises of the class seemed to fade, and even his peripheral vision seemed to darken and blur as an indefinable something built around the teacher.
“ Shovuy’z zyoxu chay, Shovuy’z zyoxu chay. Oqur!” On the last word, an arm-thick ripple of air burst from his wand and shot across the room to the slate, which flew back across the room and into Qush Yurwush’s hand.
A murmur of appreciation rose from the students. Jeff looked to Suzy. “See! THIS is what we need. THIS is how we’re getting home!”
Suzy nodded grudgingly. “It IS pretty cool. Let’s just hope they move on soon to teleporting things from one world to another. Then we’ll be set.”
Jeff watched with itching fingers as the alien kids practiced their summoning charms. He had slipped Nacho his wand on the way out of the classroom, afraid it would get confiscated. Now he gritted his teeth in frustration, though part of him knew it might cause problems if a human pulled out a wand in the aliens’ school.
It was also disorienting being in the room with so many people using magic at once. As the kids practiced building up spells as the teacher had done, Jeff experienced a powerful pull each time to watch. And when three or four kids were building up spells at the same time, it made him twitchy, trying to focus on all of them at once.
Beside Jeff, Ushegg was ignoring the lesson, instead trying to pick others’ boards out of the air as they came flying across the room. Finally he noticed the hungry look in Jeff’s eye and said, “Thia borx o xashr?” He held out his tiny wand to Jeff.
Jeff took the wand gingerly. Slowly, he turned to the wall where the
