well.
Chapter 12: Kargan
The new Students were dismissed to the Refectory for the mid-day meal, and some of the other boys sat with Grimm to ask him more about these mysterious colours and what they meant. He was more than happy to tell them what he know about the skill, but the boys drifted away after he had told them what they wanted to know. He looked about for Madar, the friendly boy he had met in the hall, but Madar was earnestly, confidently holding court at the far end of the Refectory. A large group of other young Students seemed quite engrossed in whatever it was that Madar was saying.
Knowing he was forbidden to sit in the hallowed area reserved for the rich Students, Grimm worked his way through an insipid meal of broad beans and mutton in silence, ignored by the other Students at his end of the Refectory.
In the afternoon, the boys were faced with the dynamic, enthusiastic figure of Magemaster Kargan, a welcome change from the forbidding Crohn, with a shock of grey hair, a neat goatee of the same colour and blue-tinted spectacles that gave him an indefinable air of mystery. Despite the colour of his hair and beard, Kargan's unlined face and broad, toothy smile looked as if they belonged on a much younger man.
Where Crohn had announced the beginning of his lecture by banging his staff on the stone floor, Kargan began by ostentatiously slamming a pile of books onto the front desk with an impressive thump that made even the most torpid boy jerk into an upright position.
Leaning forward on the balls of his feet, he spoke in a conspiratorial stage whisper.
'You may have heard rumours that I am slightly unhinged,' he began. 'Those rumours may well be true.' The beaming, somewhat manic expression on his face did not contradict this statement.
'Greetings, Students,' he cried in a loud but singsong voice. 'I am Kargan Lindata.' He paused to scribble his name on the slate board, 'and for my pains it has fallen to my lot to try to teach you talentless ingrates something of Runes, Spell Reading and Recital.'
Kargan drew a deep breath and continued in a quieter tone.
'No doubt,' he said, 'Magemaster Crohn has told you much of our noble calling but, in my experience, most of the pampered pets that come here merely hope to learn a few impressive tricks. Whether you learn or not is nothing to me; I have seen many a moneyed dilettante pass through these halls and I am not one who lusts for a magely Acclamation; I have held this staff for over twenty years, and I could not care less if you fritter your whole time away until you become bored and leave.
'Nonetheless, I have to try to cram some of my hard earned knowledge into those thick pates of yours until something sticks.'
The booming voice dropped again to a low level, a parody of a tragedian's soliloquy.
'I have studied and struggled for fifty-eight long years, only to come to this lot of ingrates,' he said, adding a theatrical sigh and slapping a hand to his brow. 'Nobody appreciates my vast talents.' Some of the boys smiled, Grimm among them, recognising the new Magemaster's dry humour.
'RUNES!' Kargan shrieked in a mighty voice which made the boys sit bolt upright again. 'RUNES ARE THE LANGUAGE OF MAGICAL LORE!'
Some of the Students regarded the Magemaster with wide, fearful eyes after this thundering declamation, but Grimm could recognise play-acting when he saw it; he guessed that Kargan was not in truth the fire-breathing maniac he appeared.
The young Student found Kargan's style of education more entertaining, at least, than that of Magemaster Crohn, not least because Kargan did not seem to share Crohn's scruples with regard to the use of 'Mage Speech'.
'Don't listen to what the other Magemasters may tell you about how important this facet of lore is, or how central that principle is. This is the most vital part of magic. This is magic!'
Panting a little, and flicking grey locks from his eyes, Kargan began to rattle out a swift and complex litany that seemed designed solely to confound the Students.
'Magical runes belong to a one-hundred-and-sixty-three letter alphabet divided into six families, with twenty- seven accents and fifty-two inflections. The runes of each family vary in context depending on order, tone, speed of delivery and cadence.
'A spell consists of a series of runes, chanted with perfect diction and tone. A given rune will link smoothly only to certain others, and only in certain ways. Some runes can't be used to begin or end a spell. An accented rune cannot be used before a joining-rune or after a rising inflection except when preceded by a tonal modifier.'
Although Grimm loved books and read all he could, he did not understand most of what the Magemaster had said, and he feared that all Kargan's lessons would be given in this rapid-fire, impenetrable style.
Perhaps the other boys were trained in this sort of language, he thought. Maybe I'll never get the hang of it! He risked a surreptitious glance at the rest of the class, but the blank, stunned expressions of the other Students suggested that they were as confused as he.
'Sounds complicated, doesn't it?' Kargan beamed like a madman. 'It is. Yet this is one subject you will have to learn and understand before you take the ring. I did not lie: from the understanding of runes comes the whole panoply of performed magic and sorcery.'
Kargan paused to let his words sink in, his head swivelling back and forth like an owl's as he scanned his stunned flock.
'Like music,' he said, 'if you do not have the ear for it, you may be able to scratch out a few simple spells by rote, but you will never become a spellcaster, any more than a tone-deaf urchin can play for the Gallorley Philharmonia.'
A wide, seraphic grin appeared on the mage's face. 'So let's see if any of you has a half-way decent ear. You're all going to sing for me!' Kargan's expression suggested that he had just offered the Students some marvellous treat, but some of the boys looked aghast.
What has singing to do with magic? Grimm wondered, and he could tell he was not alone in this thought.
Kargan turned to Madar, sitting at the right hand side of the front bench. 'Stand up, boy! What is your name?'
In a tiny voice, the boy stammered, 'M-Madar Gaheela, Lord M-Mage.'
Kargan nodded, and his own voice reduced in intensity to a bearable level as he said, 'Ah, yes; Gaheela. Your father would be Ahad Gaheela, the master trader? In that case, I trust you have inherited his love of music, and even a little of his talent. I heard him playing the violin when I was an honoured guest at last year's New Year Recital in Ayre. It was most moving!'
He regarded the boy with apparent respect, but he did not speak. As the silence became uncomfortable, Madar blurted, 'I can play the violin, the vihuela, the trumpet and the dulcimer, Lord Mage. Last year I won a credential as First Cantor in the Preslor Abbey choir.'
'EX-cellent!' crowed the strange mage. 'Then I am sure you won't have any problem singing this little phrase. Sing it exactly as you hear it, and don't try to interpret it. We're looking for perfection here, Gaheela, not artistic impression.'
Kargan produced a silver flute from his robes and played a fluent, liquid ten-second phrase with trills and strange intervals. After clearing his throat, Madar repeated it in a clear, strong voice.
Kargan nodded. 'You may sit down, Gaheela, that was quite adequate.' Almost as an afterthought, he added, 'Almost acceptable, in fact.'
Grimm saw Madar stiffen, and he could tell his friend felt affronted. Nonetheless, the red-headed boy sat and said nothing.
Kargan played a different phrase to each boy, each of whom repeated the flute's notes with varying degrees of success. For some of the boys, Kargan had to repeat the phrase several times, each time with growing
