Life at Thornfield quickly settled into routine. Early evenings were spent schoolwide in rigorous on work. The third- and fourth-year students assisted the Masters teag and sparring with the first- and sed-years. After the midnight lun came more bat studies, first in pairs, then in rger groups led by the most senior students. Thornfield’s fortifications, although in some pces outdated, served as an excellent training ground for castle attad defense.

  Izak did what he had to do to get by until the physical exertion portion of the day was over. Learning to hack a man open was never going to be his favorite subject, any more than learning to cook them alive from the i had been. More was the pity that it took up two-thirds of his night.

  Twenty-six went above and beyond what was required because overachievement was all he knew. His brief stint as a raed ander hadn’t risen from putting forth minimum effort, and redeeming the blood debt wasn’t going to either. Maybe if he’d worked harder when he was still a Raen, the dirter attack would have turned out differently.

  Nine was agog at seeing the pirate practig with both a cutss and swordbreaker at once.

  “You got two bdes?” Subjects weren’t Nine’s strength—sitting still long enough to learn numbers aers was torture—but even Nine could do that math. One sword made you dangerous; two swords made you twibsp;as dangerous.

  ***

  Saint Daven was overseeing sword drills when the smelly delta brat tugged on his sleeve.

  “I gotta have two swords, me,” Nine said.

  There was no doubt that with a sword in hand the boy was a force to be reed with. Unfortunately, it was mostly Saint Daven who had to do the reing to keep Nine from killing audent actally or in a fit of temper. There was no way Saint Daven was going to put two bdes in those grimy little paws.

  “You barely handle one sword,” he told the brat. “Get back to your drills.”

  ***

  The evening, Nine showed up in the bailey with a matched pair of dual swords.

  Saint Galen frowned. “Where’d you get those?”

  “The other master st night said I ’t handle one sword, so I hafta learn two of ’em.”

  “And you believed him?” Saint Daven excimed wheory came out ter.

  “Those swords came from Master Smith!” Saint Galen snapped. “They’ve got his proof marks! Where else would he get them? Anyway, you said you were looking to train more dual wielders. I figured you picked the brat.”

  Saint Daven rubbed his eyes. He and Gale had barely been teag for a year, and already a student had gotteter of them. When wot out, the older masters were going to have a good hard ugh.

  “All right, from now on, we don’t alterhe nights we lead training. You lead one week; I’ll lead the . And if a student says one of us told them to do something, we check.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure that will work swell,” Saint Galen muttered.

  ***

  When Master Saint Daven came around the fe, asking Master Smith about the bdes, Smith just shrugged his enormous shoulders.

  “Maybe I gave them swords to the little cur, maybe I didn’t.”

  To Smith’s mind, there was tensioweeher masters and himself. He was certain they looked down on him for having never been a Thorn—he had no blood magic; he’d just shown up at Thornfield when the previous smith happeo be looking for an apprentice.

  Master Smith hadn’t given the dual swords to Nine, but he had a healthy appreciation for the mischief boys got up to, and doubly so when it tweaked the noses of the former Thorns. The boys were being raised up to die, after all; they could stand a little fun in the meantime.

  Before it came out that they had been pyed against one another by a student, the Saints took the matter to Grandmaster.

  “Unless I’m mistaken, you wanted more dual wielders,” Heartless said. “Let the boy keep them. He’ll regret making twice as much work for himself soon enough.”

  So rained with dual swords. Pretty wasn’t going to believe how dangerous her twin was now!

  ***

  Around dawn eaight, bde training ended and the students of Thornfield split up for lectures. Everyone was required to drill courtly protocol, but that was where the b instru ehe most ignorant of the new recruits were put through a rigorous course of letters and numbers. The most educated sat through discussions on political sces, antiquities, and areries, with the remainder filling in the csses iween. If a mahornfield without an education, it would not be through any fault of the masters.

  “ you believe that pirate’s in the advanced sces?” Thankfully, Penuel-Denuel had been given the number Fifty-one so Izak didn’t have to remember his name. “He must’ve captured a mert ship with a priest on it and tortured reading lessons out of them.”

  Izak, who had made careful note of his fellow recruits’ results during the educational evaluation, wasn’t surprised about the pirate’s advanced pt. He’d scored exceptionally well.

  What surprised Izak was that dull-witted Fifty-one had been allowed to take the advanced lectures.

  But Izak was curious hoirate who had received appraisals nearly as high as his own ihing but courtly etiquette and history could be dense enough to keep arguing with the masters. In the first week of lectures, Twenty-six was whipped twice more for disrespece for calling Master of Archives Risk a liar, once for saying the archivist who had taken down the histories he referenced was a liar.

  “You know, you don’t have to believe any of it,” Izak told his surly roommate when the pirate limped back to their room after the sed sc. They were the only ohere; Nine had beeeo scullery again for distrag other students duriures. “The masters just want you to parrot their nonsense back to them.”

  Twenty-six had gotten a roll of bandages from somewhere and was smearing them with salve. He stopped long enough to gre at Izak.

  “To not call out the truth is to give a liar permission.”

  Izak shrugged. “So give them permission. It doesn’t matter who started what war a hundred years ago.”

  “All systems of w rest on fault.” Awkwardly, the pirate began winding the salved bandages around his shoulders. His aced scowl twinged as one caught the raw edge of a wound. The varian expression was gone so quickly that Izak could almost believe he’d imagi. “If fault be transferred based on whim, then it is meaningless, and so is the system built upon it.”

  It was the most Twenty-six had said to him sinrollment. Clearly, argument was the best way to she pirate in versation.

  “Every system is meaningless,” Izak said. “Especially if you’re born high enough or low enough. The folks in the middle, they’re the ones who’ve got to py the game or face the sequences.”

  “One ot be born above or below the ws of honor.”

  “But one be born without an i in honor.”

  “I does not matter. Everyone is subject to the ultimate judgment of the God of the Waves. His authority is the final system. No one escapes it.”

  “That’s heresy, friend. There is no God of This or That. The strong gods own it all, praise their bloody, meddling fingers, and so on.”

  The bandages were bung uselessly behind Twenty-six’s back, and his yanks weren’t doing anything to spread them out. “You say every system is meaningless, yet you observe the system of authority imposed by yods.”

  “I’m a plex man.” Izak hopped off his bed. “You’re doing a terrible job. Give me that.”

  He snatched the ball of bandages from his roommate, and Twenty-six rounded on him, ready to fight.

  “Hit me if you want to.” Izak could heal a split lip or bck eye in minutes. “But we’ve only got so much time before we’re expected to serve dinner, and I doubt the seniors want you dripping pirate blood into their food.”

  On top of the training aures, first-years were heaped with chore work. They drudged iables, sculled i, scrubbed the undry, and served the meals for the ey of Thornfield, the belowstairs servants included. If even one of them shirked a task or came te to it, the lot of them were given hours of extra drills as punishment. Izak’s muscles felt watery enough at the end of the night without more abuse.

  Relutly seeing reason, Twenty-six turned bad let Izak get on with it.

  “Why not let the healers fix you up?” Izak asked as he adjusted the bandages. “Doesn’t blood magic work on pirates?”

  “Drinking blood is an abomination.”

  “It’s an acquired taste, but drinking it isn’t required for the blood magic to work on you.” Beh the pirate’s bleeding sh marks y a set of much older scars. Izak raised an eyebrow. “You really must be a slow learhese scars look as if they came from a sc, too.”

  “They are of no to someone born without an i in honor.”

  “Have it your way.” Izak sliced off the cloth strip and khe ends. He tossed the leftover bao Twenty-six. “Keep the spares. You seem like the kind of man who’ll hem again.”