Elias' Big Day

On the final morning of the week, four names stood on the board: Mage, Knight, Healer, and Scout. Holt had written them neatly beneath one another and placed beside them the students whose direction had already been decided. My name was missing. It was not an accident. Too many people kept looking at the empty space beneath the four lists.

The restlessness began before the bell. Bren claimed Holt only needed a fifth column. Nera replied that they could not invent a new direction for every difficult student, while Senn said nothing at all. He studied the names on the board as though mine might appear if he waited long enough.

Bren“Perhaps he will put you on every list. Then you will be worth four times as much and have to do four times as many tasks.”

Nera“Or make four times as many mistakes.”

Bren grinned, but the conversations stopped when Holt entered. He did not check the lists. He knew who was on them. Instead, he announced that the final placements would be discussed after midday. He looked at me only once, briefly enough to call it chance.

Half the class remained in the room during the break. The courtyard had been reopened outside, but the path to the chapel was still behind the barrier. No one wanted to look there, so everyone looked at the board.

Bren“You are not a knight. You think too long.”

Nera“Not a scout either. He notices something and then stands in front of it until it becomes dangerous.”

Elias“Good to know you are settling this without me.”

Bren turned a chair around and sat on it backwards. “We are only trying to save Holt some work.” A quiet laugh came from the window side. It was not hostile, but not friendly enough to be meaningless.

Student“Call him a Guardian.”

The word did not change the room as clearly as the forest had on the first day, but I noticed that several students knew it. Nera raised her head. Bren stopped grinning. Senn looked from the board to me.

Nera“Where did you hear that?”

Student“From someone in the third year. After the impact, somebody apparently said Vorn had behaved like one of the old Guardians.”

Bren“What makes one old?”

Student“No idea. They do not exist any more.”

The conversation could have ended there. Instead, the word remained between us. It belonged to none of the lines on the board, and that was precisely why it fitted the empty space. Bren said a Guardian had to be strong. Nera replied that strength was probably the reason there were none left. Senn ran his thumb along the edge of his notebook.

Senn“At the stone, he went back.”

Everyone looked at him. Senn rarely spoke before the whole class, and when he did, no one liked to interrupt before he withdrew again.

Senn“Not because of the task. Because of us.”

Bren“And afterwards he gave our things to everyone.”

Elias“You complained about that.”

Bren“I complain about correct decisions too.”

Several students laughed this time. Only the boy by the window did not. He leaned back and studied me as though the matter had already been settled and was simply not very interesting.

Student“Guardian of whom? He does not even have parents to complain if he gets himself broken.”

The laughter stopped. Not completely. Somewhere at the back, a brief sound escaped and vanished into a cough. I knew the word parents. I knew what it meant. But it brought no faces, no voices, and no place to which I could have returned. It was not a lost image. It was an empty space someone had given a name.

Heat rose into my throat. For a moment, I did not know whether I should become sad or angry. Grief required something I missed. Anger needed someone to blame. Neither found a hold, so both reached for the boy by the window.

The edge of the desk grew warm beneath my hand. Not red. Not yet. I removed my fingers and placed them in my lap.

Nera“You know nothing about him.”

Student“Neither do you.”

Nera“At least we are not proud of it.”

Bren stood. He said nothing and did not need to. The boy by the window raised both hands as though it had only been a bad joke. Perhaps it had been one to him. That did not make it better.

Elias“Leave him.”

My voice sounded calmer than I felt. Bren looked at me, searched for something in my face, and sat down again. I wanted to answer the boy. Instead, I wondered why his words could hurt at all when I remembered no one they could take from me.

Senn“A Guardian stands where someone is missing.”

Senn said it quietly. Even so, everyone heard. My eyes went to the empty chair beside me. I thought of Mara in the forest and of her saying that perhaps I belonged where other people made mistakes. At the time, I had taken it for comfort. Now it sounded like a task.

After midday, the remaining students were called in one by one. Some returned relieved. Others wore the expression of someone who had just learnt that their own idea of themselves was not binding. My name came last.

Holt was not waiting alone. Beside him stood the healer from the courtyard and an older teacher whose name I did not know. My records, the report from the forest, and a nearly blank sheet lay on the table.

Darian Holt“We cannot assign you to one direction without ignoring part of the way you respond.”

Elias“Then do not.”

The older teacher raised an eyebrow. Holt remained calm. “What do you suggest?” I had rehearsed the sentence on the way there. In my head it had been longer, more reasonable, and less final. Before the three teachers, only what I truly meant remained.

Elias“I want to become a Guardian.”

No one asked what I meant. The healer looked at Holt at once. The older teacher placed a hand on the nearly blank sheet as though he had to stop something from appearing on it by itself.

Holt rose slowly. For the first time since I had known him, his calm did not look controlled. It looked forced.

Darian Holt“Who taught you that word?”