...''I did ask him but''...whispers continue to come from my left. The voices were Lana Furia's, the girl with the pale brown eyes, and that of her close companion, Ariana Cassian. She is a tall girl with a long torso, fastidious type, always tidy. Not a speck of dirt on her or her dormitory's bed?—but who notices things like that. I'm slightly jealous of her impeccably styled ink-bck hair?. Ariana is one, but looks two years older than me, really. Both of them giggle about something.

  Grandmaster Vidar suddenly halts pacing, he even stops insulting us. I think he...I think he stopped breathing too. He tilts his big blocky head a little and just looks at the girls with cold eyes that seem to struggle to stay in their eye sockets. ''You all must forgive me. I am a creature of weak, feeble mind.'' Like a stage performer who has done his act a thousand times, he seems more bored than angry and unnaturally nods at us while speaking. The nods are somehow artificial, with contrivance in each movement. ''We'll do a tiny bit of running but in the main courtyard, down below.''

  With great zeal in each step, Grandmaster Vidar starts dashing toward the exit. ''Hippity-hop. Those that don't keep up, don't get to eat tomorrow and lose library privileges for a week!''

  In the course of my very first months at the Academy, the rge rectangur yards of sand, framed by covered porticos of the Academy's many gymnasiums, are each student's second home. During our physical csses there or while continuously running the long outer courtyard with that giant green statue of Teshub Lartia in the middle; the cushy coats, dark-green breeches, and snugly, almost knee-high, leathery chestnut-brown tall boots, are all suppnted, and we are made to wear blue double-stitched woolen tunics with sturdy heavy-soled hobnailed sandals. The strong tunic ends just above the knees with the excess cloth being draped over the cord belt.

  I like the fresh air and the feeling of the pale sun on my skin.

  We carry heavy weights, pull wagons, swim in one of the many smaller canals, and mostly: we wrestle—a nerve-wracking activity for some such as me. I can proudly say that not a single bone was broken since I'm a gentle little bird. One shoulder was dislocated but this was not by my design—one of the boys did it to another because they're morons.