Chelsea & Liss,

This place is amazing.

I told you about the Pit, right? A big spell trap where they make illusions for the Initiations? Well, they can also make illusions for other things, and there’s a whole array of sports that Kylie calls ‘scifi holodeck nonsense’ that can be played in there. One-on-one magic duels, races through labyrinths full of puzzles and riddles; we watched some people play Capture the Flag the other day and it was awesome. I’m going to sign up for… something. I don’t know what yet. Maybe one of the maze race type things? A lot of the games have fighting, and I’m not really into fighting, what with all those years of suppressing the curse.

Also, I met some more cursed people, so that was pretty cool.

How are things going with you guys? Your youtube channel still going strong?

Love you,

Kayden

I stared at the letter. It was a bit short, but whatever. It was probably a good thing that there wasn’t any High Drama to write home about for the moment. I wrote one for my parents, saying essentially the same things in different words and adding that I was getting into potioncrafting (since they’d care about academic stuff like that) and telling them I hoped to be good enough at it to bring them a proper magic potion when the school holidays rolled around. I didn’t mention hormone replacement therapy in either of the letters. That was… still something I was getting used to. And my parents, well. They’d always been supportive, but they could be cautious about big decisions. I didn’t want to start anything, especially since they weren’t completely happy about me still being at Refujeyo.

I dropped the letters off and went to find Magista in the library, where she was studying with Max, and ask her about pit competitions. Presumably, the… team tryouts, or whatever… were all over, but I wanted to get some more information on how they worked to consider whether I should try next year.

“Oh, you can form a team whenever with whoever,” Magista assured me. “There are the big teams who are playing for points, and obviously they have schedules and play in ranked competitions, like the one we watched. But if you just want to have some fun and don’t care about the, you know, overall competition, then you can form or join one of the smaller teams. Or if you just want to do single combat, you can go in yourself, without a team. Most new acolytes form small casual teams to get practice in, It’s really rare for someone to get straight onto a ranked team,” she added, with a hint of pride.

“How many people do you need for a team?”

“Depends on what games you want to play. Most casual teams are three to six people, but that limits the size of games you can play unless teams are willing to work together. The bigger teams tend to be, well, bigger, for that reason; Sunshine has ten, so you saw all of their players out, and Ciero has twenty two and cycles players. Ciero is one of the biggest teams, and they play in a lot of different competitions.”

“What about the Amazons?”

“Nine. And two of us are quite new, so you won’t see us in ten-by-ten matches. Everyone says the big teams are just full of seckies anyway, but – ”

“Seckies?”

“Jocks,” Max translated, not looking up from his book. “Magista has been captured by the stereotype. She’ll become a Pit Comp star and dive straight into a job at Sekura Refujeyo.”

“You’ve caught me,” Magista said, deadpan. “My life’s goal is to dump all of the family responsibility on my brother and run off to be a wizard cop.”

“I was think you’d be more, pass the pastries around to politicians during the day, beat up evildoers by night. Like Batman.”

“When would I sleep?”

“Sleep is for the weak.”

“He’s not kidding,” I said. “He was up to three in the morning working on maps today.”

“The only way you would know that, Kayden, is if you were also up until three in the morning.”

“I wasn’t, I woke up and went for some water and saw the light behind your curtain while you muttered about ‘transdirectional reference points’. So there.”

“I could’ve been talking in my sleep.”

“With the light on?”

“Maybe I’m afraid of the dark.”

“You’re not, though.”

“Fun as this is,” Magista cut in, “I’ve got a class to get to. So I’ll see you two later.”

“She needs really good marks to secretly apply to be a wizard cop,” Max told me in a stage whisper. “If she doesn’t make wizard level she’d just be a craftswoman cop, and that’s way less catchy.”

Magista apparently decided this wasn’t worth responding to, and left.

“You know,” I remarked to Max, deciding to ignore the obvious nonverbal signals that he wanted to get back to his book, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a police officer in Refujeyo. I mean, we heard some security on that recording with Alania and Clara last semester, but that’s it.”

“You’re in school. Why would there be police in school? This isn’t America.”

“That’s… fair, I guess.”

“Besides, sekurani don’t come to Skolala in uniform if they can help it. You’ll probably only see sekurani or polikani coming here if they’re, you know, actually invited, like when Alania invited the Fiore and that other gentleman to talk to us about familiars and fetishes. Or your lawyer.”

“That makes sense,” I lied, making a mental note to look up the words I didn’t understand later, but already knowing I wouldn’t.

Max frowned. “Kayden, exactly how much do you know about the governance of the society you risked your life in the Pit to join?”

“I think it’s fairly obvious that the answer to that is ‘absolutely nothing at all’.”

Max shut his book and closed his eyes for a second. “Okay. You know about the three spheres of duty, right?”

“I absolutely do not!”

“By the seven… okay. So Refujeyo is basically comprised of three groups.” He pulled out a piece of paper and drew a crude outline of a book, a sword, and what I was pretty sure was meant to be a set of scales. Skolala Refujeyo, you know about.”

“Yeah.”

“Most of the mages you’ve met work in, or are affiliated with, this one. Skolala focuses on education and research for the most part, and the heart of its territory is obviously the school. You and I are a part of it at least until we graduate. We’re governed by a High Council of eight Masters, although they don’t actually have to be academic masters; the term is an historical holdover that they really should change.” He took notes under the book picture as he spoke.

“Alania’s on that,” I said, excited to remember something. “That’s why Clara tried to blow her up, right? So she couldn’t keep convincing the others not to let twelve year olds jump into a death vortex for magical powers.”

“Essentially, yes. You’ve also got Politikala Refujeyo.” He tapped the little picture of the scales. “Their sphere is politics, finance, lawmaking… governance and diplomacy, basically. Your lawyer would belong to this branch. There’s some overlap in the spheres – everyone has PR and security and training services – but that’s the big separation. They’re ruled by the Grand Circle, which is headed by the High Crone.”

“And she owns that tower that Kylie and I accidentally trespassed in!”

“Duniyasar, yes, although you should really keep your voice down about that. Wait, are you remembering everything in relation to disasters that you personally have been involved in?”

“If you have a better memory aid than ongoing disasters, I’d like to hear about it.”

“… Fair enough. Politikala are… well, it’s kind of a first among equals kind of thing. In theory, the three spheres of duty are distinct and equal, but since Politikala make the rules and do the governance, in practice, the High Crone is the most powerful person in the world.”

“You mean the magical world.”

“What?”

“Well, the nemagisti have never heard of her, right?”

“Hmm? Yeah, I guess. Anyway, the third sphere is Sekula Refujeyo; their primary job is to keep us safe. They do some law enforcement, in a peacekeeper or security guard kind of role, but actual justice and discipline is a Politikala thing. Security, rescue services, that sort of thing.”

“Military?”

“Refujeyo doesn’t really have a military so much as just, well, some really well-funded security guards. Can you imagine the commonfolk response if we had a mage army? With how many people out there still have a Purity Revolution mindset? Refujeyo exists to keep us safe, not terrify people into wars. We’re hidden so we – oh, hey, Kylie.”

“Am I interrupting something?”

“Max is teaching me about politics,” I said, slightly accusingly. Kylie narrowed her eyes at him.

Max put his hands up. “In a ‘general knowledge of your own government’ kind of way, not a ‘mage family power game’ kind of way.”

“Oh.”

“Do you want to learn, Kylie?”

“No. I’m here to get my mage credentials and go back to my family. I’m not gonna grow up to be a politician. Kayden, Cheryl’s here for another week or so before her master takes her back to New Zealand, so if we want her in any more witch meetups we need to arrange them soon.”

I nodded. “We probably should see her again. She seems to be doing a lot better than last time I saw her, at least?”

“What happened last time?”

“She was covered in charms. Stones and yew and rowanbark, silver charms in the yard.”

“Oh,” Kylie said, sympathetic, while Max looked baffled. “I’m glad she’s got help, then.”

“Yeah. Even if her spell never wakes up…” I touched my own chest… “it’s still helpful to have context, you know?”

“So you told her about the curses?” Max asked.

“What?”

“About curses being spells. I recall that you two used to be confused on that point. Just knowing that, I’m sure, is helpful.”

I opened my mouth. Closed it again. Tried to think back to that conversation, months ago, in a little house in New Zealand. Had I told her? I had to have, right? It had to have come up. But… but I’d have remembered, because I’d have remembered her reaction to something like that, surely. And there hadn’t been any kind of dramatic reaction to anything I’d said, so… “I… don’t think it came up.”

“Seriously?”

“Hey, a lot was going on at the time, alright? I didn’t – ”

“I’m not accusing you of anything,” Max said, raising his hands again. “I’m just very surprised. I mean, from your reaction when you found out, I was under the impression that the revelation was something of a big deal.”

“It was,” I said. Had I really not mentioned it? I must have. It’s not something I wouldn’t have mentioned. Maybe she just reacted less dramatically than me, and I’d forgotten… but surely I’d have been surprised by a nonchalant reaction and remembered? Right? “How could I have left something like that out?”

“It probably doesn’t matter any more,” Max said comfortingly. “I mean, it would’ve come up at your witch meeting, right? So she’d definitely be on the same page now.”

“Yeah,” Kylie said slowly. “You would think that that is something that would’ve come up, right? The whole curse spell thing. Definitely something you’d expect a group of witches commiserating on their shared experiences to have mentioned.”

“Really?” Max asked, exasperated. “None of you? In a room full of witches?”

“She had to know, though,” Kylie said. “It just didn’t come up in our meeting. But her master would have told her; that’s his job. To tell her these things.”

Kylie and I exchanged a glance. She had to be thinking the same thing I was; Talbot’s master hadn’t exactly been straightforward with him about a lot of things. Could we be sure about Cheryl’s?

“We definitely have to see her again,” Kylie said.

“Oh, yeah,” I agreed.

“Do you think she’d object to meeting me?” Max asked.

“Why?” Kylie asked. “I mean, probably not, but… why?”

He shrugged. “Curiosity.”

“You shouldn’t be the one to tell her about the curse spell thing,” I said. “She’s pretty suspicious of mages. She seems to be working out alright with her master, but she’s suspicious of the whole setup. She once told me that if you’re getting something for free, you’re not the customer, you’re the product.”

“Not a bad philosophy. Still, I’d like to meet her.”

Kylie and I exchanged a glance. Kylie shrugged. “I could ask?”

“Thank you.”

“Not looking forward to the next meeting now,” I grumbled to myself. “‘Oh, by the way, guess what we forgot to mention?’ It’s going to be super awkward.” I recalled being very angry at Max over him not telling me this exact thing.

Perhaps I owed him an apology.