Legacies (Mercedes Lackey) - By Mercedes Lackey Page 0,76
by January third; a long incoherent rant about a missing hairdryer from Madison Harris, who seemed incapable of figuring out how not to send her private e-mails to the entire school) there was a memo from “Staff” notifying “Oakhurst Students” that “Staff” was sure they would all regret to learn that Edgar Abbot had been taken ill Sunday afternoon and had been sent to Billings for treatment, and that “Staff” joined “Oakhurst Students” in wishing Mr. Abbott a speedy recovery and return to Oakhurst.
Spirit shuddered and closed her e-mail. She wondered if Edgar would be put in the same room as Nick.
She wondered if he’d be there for the same reason.
The rest of Monday was a “normal for Oakhurst” day: English Comp, Bio, Math, and Art in the morning; Humanities, PE, Art Class, and History of Magic after lunch, and Martial Arts Class after that. All of them except PE and Art came with hefty homework assignments, and at that, Spirit was carrying a light courseload, because she didn’t have magic labs, and she was only doing one sport. Spirit didn’t know how people like Addie—with magic labs, Choral Society, swim team, dance committee, and (for most of the year) field hockey—managed to get it all done. That kind of schedule didn’t leave much room for free time at all.
But that’s the whole point, isn’t it? Spirit thought. Set us all up with crazy schedules and more work than we’d have in college, make us all see each other as competition instead of friends, make sure none of us has time to think about how crazy this place is, how the reason we’re learning all this stuff is that there are people out there waiting to kill us when we leave—or maybe something even worse . . .
She wondered how she’d managed to escape that particular trap.
And how long it would take someone in authority to notice.
That evening the five of them met briefly in one of the lounges to compare notes. Briefly, because Loch and Muirin both reported being teased about having a “gang”—which meant that despite their best efforts, they were drawing attention to themselves—and Addie had a virtual meeting of the dance committee, because the Winter Dance was a little over two weeks away and the committee still hadn’t settled on a music program. “And of course we can’t just recycle the one from the Halloween Dance—even though nobody heard most of it—because that would be too easy,” Addie said tartly. “At least I can get a lot of homework done while Kristi and Madison scream at each other in IM and Andy says we should include more Metal. You should get on it for next year, Spirit. It’d be nice to have somebody sane for a change.” She waved distractedly as she hurried off.
“I guess that leaves . . . huh,” Loch said, looking around. Muirin was already gone. “That illusion thing is pretty cool,” he said, sounding faintly puzzled.
“That ‘illusion thing’ is going to get the Murr-cat into real trouble one of these days,” Burke said.
“Or save her neck,” Loch said. “Anyway, this is a good chance for me to get in some practice time. Piano,” he explained, when the other two looked curious. He flexed his fingers theatrically. “Every good junior plutocrat gets music lessons. Although considering everything, I wish I’d studied something more portable.”
“There’s always the harmonica,” Burke said, and Loch grinned.
“Another karate lesson?” Spirit asked reluctantly, once Loch had left.
Burke shook his head. “We had class today. How about a walk?”
“In the snow?” Spirit asked in disbelief.
“Sure,” Burke said, smiling. “Get your coat. I’ll meet you at the terrace doors in fifteen.”
One thing you could say for Oakhurst, it didn’t stint its students on any of the basic necessities. At the beginning of November, Spirit had been sent a GIF-filled e-mail with winter wardrobe choices: snow boots and down filled waterproof mittens and high-tech fabric glove liners and heavy wool pants (with the notation that these were not to be considered classroom wear under any circumstances) and long johns and heavy wool hats and thicker scarves than the one she already had (with an appliqué of the school crest on the ends, in her choice of the three school colors) and her choice of heavy winter coat in two lengths. The fact that she already had a warm coat and hat and scarf and was being issued a warmer coat and enough extra gear to outfit an expedition to the North Pole