Birthright-The Technomage Archive by B.J. Keeton Read Free Book Online Page B

and when the time comes for Mr. Dann to know about your training, we'll let you know.”
    “ But he's my roommate! How is he not going to find out what I'm studying?” Ceril asked. He was honestly curious about how he was supposed to keep something like this a secret. “It’ll probably be pretty obvious that I'm not studying agriculture.”
    “ I don’t think so,” the headmaster said. “Thank you, Ceril. Professor Nephil.”
    And with that, Nephil and Ceril passed through the doorway back into Ennd’s. Ceril's skin tingled again. The early afternoon light in the headmaster’s office was gone. The twin suns had long since set, as though the headmaster's office somehow kept up the illusion of daytime.
    “ Is it night now, Professor?” Ceril asked.
    “ It would appear so,” Nephil said, unperturbed.
    “ But how?” Ceril said. After what they had just discussed, he thought it was okay to ask the professor about Instances now. “Was Headmaster Squalt’s office an Instance?”
    “ Yes, it was.”
    “ But how can the sun still be up, even if it's an Instance? I thought that they…”
    Nephil interrupted him by saying, “The quick answer is that time is not necessarily the same everywhere, Ceril. Five minutes here may be two hours in some other Instance. An Instance’s location in space has very little bearing on its location in time, I’m afraid. I’m sure that's something that will be covered in your upcoming instruction. Suffice it to say, though, that the rumors that fill these halls about Instancing are…underwhelming.”
    “ Oh, well, okay,” he said. “And Professor?”
    “ Mmm hmm?”
    “ Swarley showed me a holovid last night. These people in it, they had swords like the one the headmaster had.” Ceril gulped, unsure if he should continue. “Like the one that I—”
    Again, Nephil cut him off. “The incidents over the summer, Ceril, have nothing to do with the Charons. Or more accurately, they have nothing to do with the Charons as you will learn about them and become a part of. Do you remember how the headmaster mentioned the old civil war? The one that preceded the construction of this school?”
    Ceril nodded.
    “ Well, the people who lost that war have apparently made their way back to Erlon. And they don’t really like the way we do things around here.”

Chapter Four

    Ceril opened his eyes. It was dark. He rolled over, pulled the blanket over his shoulder, and tucked it beneath his chin. Dark was good. It meant there was still time for sleep. Ceril rolled over and tried to clear his mind. He wasn’t surprised at being unable to sleep; he was irritated by it. He stared out the window and looked at the stars. The constellations at Ennd’s were different from the ones in Ternia, and he never got used to the change. He watched them slowly drift across the window and eventually felt himself doze off.
    When he opened his eyes again, it was still dark. The constellations had moved, but not much. He must not have made it all the way to sleep. He felt himself doze off again, and once again, he woke up with it still dark outside. Time seemed to crawl for Ceril that night, and his body ached from the tossing and turning he had been doing.
    By the time his alarm sounded just past dawn, he was already fully awake. He had been for hours. Ceril grabbed the clothes he had worn for Presentation yesterday—Nephil had not given him instructions on how to dress, but he figured he couldn’t go wrong with his dress uniform—and ran to the shower with high hopes that the hot water would ease the ache in his neck and back.
    As he left the dormitory, Ceril looked at Swarley’s side of the room. He hadn’t been at home when Ceril had finally made it back, and with his insomnia, Ceril was sure to have noticed him coming in late. There was a curfew for students, and Ceril was worried that Swarley was going to be in trouble for breaking it. More than that, though, he hoped to have a chance to say