books, deep in thought about the Miyabi Defense’s convoluted history and the Blad Defense’s nontraditional application of Lines of Warding. His stomach growled in complaint at being ignored.
Hopefully he hadn’t missed supper. Everyone ate together—professors, staff, children, even Rithmatists. The only ordinary students who lived on campus were the children of faculty or staff, like Joel. Many of the Rithmatic students lived in the dorms. They either had family who lived too far away to visit, or they needed to accommodate extra study time. All in all, about half of the Rithmatists in Armedius lived in the dorms. The rest still commuted.
The wide-open dining hall was a hubbub of activity and chaos. Professors and spouses sat on the far left side of the room, laughing and talking together, their children seated at separate tables. Staff were on the right side of the chamber, settled at several large wooden tables. The Rithmatic students had their own long table at the back of the room, almost tucked away behind a brick outcropping.
Two long tables in the center of the room were set with the day’s offering. While servers dished plates and carried them over to the professors, the family and staff were expected to serve themselves. Most people were already seated on their benches, eating, their chatting causing a low buzz in the room. Dishes clanked, the kitchen staff bustled about, and an amalgamation of scents battled with one another.
Joel made his way to his place across the long table from his mother. She was there already, which relieved him. Sometimes she worked through dinner. She still wore her brown working dress, hair up in a bun, and she picked at her food as she talked to Mrs. Cornelius, one of the other cleaning ladies.
Joel set down his books, then hurried away before his mother could pester him with questions. He piled his plate with some rice and stir-fried sausages. Germanian food. The cooks were getting exotic again. At least they’d moved away from JoSeun dishes, which Joel found far too spicy. After grabbing a flagon of spiced apple juice, he made his way back to his place.
His mother was waiting. “Florence told me that you promised to have a summer elective chosen by tonight,” she said.
“I’m working on it,” he said.
“Joel,” she said. “You are going to have a summer elective, aren’t you? You’re not going to need to go to a tutelage again?”
“No, no,” he said. “I promise. Professor Layton just told me today that I’m passing math for sure.”
His mother stabbed a sausage chunk with her fork. “Other children try to do more than just pass their classes.”
Joel shrugged.
“If I had more time to help you with your homework…” She sighed. After the meal, she would spend most of the night cleaning. She didn’t start work each day until the afternoon, since most of the classrooms she cleaned were occupied during the day.
Like always, she had dark circles under her eyes. She worked far too hard.
“What about alchemics?” she asked. “Will you pass that?”
“Science is easy,” Joel said. “Professor Langor already gave us our performance reports—the last days will just be lab, and won’t be graded. I’m passing for sure.”
“Literature?”
“Handed in my report today,” Joel said. He’d gotten that assignment done on time—only because Professor ZoBell had given them writing time in class for two weeks while she poked through a series of novels. Professors tended to get a little bit lazy during the end of term, just like students.
“And history?” his mother asked.
“Term evaluation exam tomorrow.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“It’s on the history of Rithmatics, Mother,” he said, rolling his eyes. “I’ll do fine.”
That seemed to satisfy her. Joel began to wolf down his food.
“You heard about Professor Fitch and that awful challenge?” his mother asked.
Joel nodded, mouth full.
“Poor man,” she said. “You know that he spent twenty years working himself up to full professor? He lost it in a few moments, back down to tutor.”
“Mother,” Joel said between bites, “have you heard anything about a federal inspector on campus?”
She nodded absently. “They think one of the Rithmatic students ran away last night. She was visiting her family for the evening, and never came back to the school.”
“Was it Lilly Whiting?” Joel guessed.
“I think that was her name.”
“Charlington said her parents just took her on vacation!”
“That was the story at first,” his mother said. “It’s hard to keep something like a runaway Rithmatist secret, though. Makes me wonder why they try to flee so often. They have such easy