Lesson

Finley Cai Aies Hall March 29th, 20XX

My hands hovered between my raging stomach and pounding head as I tried to decide which to tend to first. I tried to force my eyelids open and place where I was in the other world, but eventually gave up after two to three tries. My body was heavy as I laid down on a soft platform, so I stayed still as the nausea subsided.

After a few minutes, I finally gained the strength to open my eyes and sit up. The first thing I did upon opening my eyes was to slam them closed before the bright gold flecks that bounced around in my field of vision and the intense green decor that made up Esmeralda’s office irritated them more. It looked like they had summoned me directly here instead of the giant room they had put me in previously.

A quick scan of the room after my eyes had acclimatized to the widely different colour scheme of the setting showed me Esmeralda, who hovered over me with an irritated expression on her face. Cambridge hurried forward and helped me onto my feet as I stood, but I could see she looked displeased as well.

Esmeralda suddenly trilled at me in a pitch that did very little to soothe the raging headache I was still battling.

“May I ask what you’re doing in that ridiculous human guise?”

“Would you rather I went around the human world with a giant pair of sparkly wings on my back then?”

My speech suddenly became formal as I retorted to Esmeralda’s scolding, but I also felt myself slightly duck behind Cambridge’s small but intimidating frame. It wasn’t like I found Esmeralda particularly scary, but acting as if I did would make Cambridge jump to my defence.

I still hadn’t figured out the power dynamic between the two, but I knew Esmeralda yielded to Cambridge more than Cambridge had to yield to Esmeralda.

“Watch yourself, Esmeralda.”

As good as it felt to have someone have my back for dumb confrontations like this, I recognized it was the best that Cambridge hadn’t ended up as my primary caretaker. There was no way I would have turned out decent.

Under Cambridge’s glare, Esmeralda lowered her pitch to one that was bearable and kept the condescending attitude to a minimum. She ruffled her wings and shook out her dress to show her discontent at being checked.

“I would like you to change out of that appearance your highness, it is impossible to take you seriously.”

In her dress that I could only describe as the illegitimate child of a cupcake and a green cloud of cotton candy, I doubted she could have said anything more hypocritical. I kept such thoughts to myself and put my hand up to my locket, quickly activating the spell I’d learned earlier today.

“Reserare”

She watched the transformation with a mix of curiosity and disapproval. I ignored her and made to cut off the black ends of my now golden head, but Cambridge stopped me. She withdrew a sharp dagger from an invisible pocket and trimmed my hair with swift and confident motions that showed her expertise with the weapon came not from cutting hair.

“So you’ve already learned a transformation spell.”

While it wasn’t a question, Esmeralda still paused for an answer, an answer I chose not to provide. It wasn’t like I needed to hide the diary from her, but I couldn’t give up the opportunity to frustrate her.

“So I have.”

Her expression soured at my non-reply, but one look at my position behind Cambridge made her move on to the lesson I was here for.

“I originally wanted to give you some time to adjust to this world and to come to a few conclusions on your own, but since you insist on staying in the human world, we’ll have less time than I think is necessary. As your mother’s aide, it is natural that I take responsibility for your early education, but since you refuse to attend the boarding school after, I’ll have to share this responsibility with Cambridge.”

She preempted my question of why she had to be the one to teach me. She didn’t look happy about it either, so I wondered why she was so possessive of the responsibility. Even if my mother would have wanted her to, it wasn’t like she was around to enforce it.

Cambridge grabbed my arm and walked me to a desk and chair set I hadn’t noticed until now. But well, escorted me would have been more appropriate terminology but saying it like that hurt my pride a bit.

Esmeralda drew a thin and long stick that was as garish a green as the rest of the room but had bronze engravings carved on and into its body. The engravings flashed as she moved it and reflected the light and the magic particles in the room. I waited for the particles to swirl around the wand as they had with mine, but they stayed ambient and carelessly bounced around her.

“Since you moved at such a young age, we’re going to start with the basics.”

A map sprawled out on the board behind her and a fantasy-like landscape showed itself divided into four parts. As the map developed, the land formations dyed themselves either Gold, Silver or Red. The gold parts took up a large majority of the map, with the Silver parts coming in at a close second and the red parts having the smallest share.

“All the parts that are dyed gold are the Fairylands, the silver parts are the Goblinlands and the reds belong to the Witches. You’re unlikely to ever venture out of the fairy lands so just focus on remembering the borders. When you’re presentable, Cambridge will take you on an official tour of the lands. Please save the questions for later.”

She cut me off before I could ask my question.

“We fairies live in a monarchy, meaning that we have a ruling class, the monarchs. Unlike the human world, we’ve only ever had one Royal family, yours. This is because the royal family is born with the special ability to purify magic. This is what a magic fleck looks like, although-”

The map dissolved, and a familiar-looking shape bloomed on the platform. I spoke before I’d thought it through and ended up interrupting Esmeralda.

“Oh, is that what those specks in the air are?”

Her eyes narrowed as I cut her off, but it quickly tensed into a shocked expression as she registered what I said. I didn’t think it was such a big deal until I saw both Cambridge and Esmerelda looking so offset.

“What? Did I say something bad?”

“Y-you can see them? Well, you are a royal after all. I-it’s not that odd.”

Although she tried to brush it off, I gathered that seeing these things was something that only Royals could do. But I also gathered that I shouldn’t have been able to see them.

Something was off here, but then again, so was everything else.

Now wasn’t the time for suspicions, although I had a lot of them. Right now I just needed to listen and try to understand as much of it as I could.