Soul Fire

  ~Chapter Five~

   

   

   

   

   

   

   

   

  The bell didn’t have a chance to ring once before I was out of bed. As soon as my feet hit the floor, I hooked my feet under the bed frame, crossed my arms over my chest and began to do as many sit ups as I could. Larni entered the room just as I began to do push ups.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, setting my breakfast platter on the table.

  “Next time I run that course, I’m not giving up in it,” I told her, standing up and wiping my face on the sleeve on my pyjamas. “Though it might take me a while to get back into shape; the heaviest thing I’ve lifted recently is my library bag.”

  “There is a library here,” Larni told me, laying out my uniform. “The students are free to use it.”

  “Really?” I perked up immediately.

  “Of course. I can show you on the weekend; you get those off.”

  “Do you?”

  She looked at me, puzzled.

  “Do I what?”

  “Do you get the weekend off?”

  She gnawed her lip and then sat down opposite me, something she’d never done before.

  “I get every second Sunday off to visit my family,” she said quietly. “But every other day I’m here at the Academy.”

  “Every second Sunday?” I repeated. I suddenly thought of something. “Larni, do you get paid?”

  Silence fell between us.

  “It is payment enough that the Academy feeds and accommodates me, with my lack of magical blood,” she said eventually.

  I gripped her wrist as she stood up to leave.

  “Larni,” she refused to meet my eyes. “Why would you think that?”

  She didn’t pull away but didn’t look down at me.

  “Both of my parents are mages. I disgrace them by not following in their footsteps.”

  “Do you get a choice?” I asked, frowning.

  “No. I went to the magic tester when I was four. He said I had none.”

  “Then how is it your fault?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Larni,” I said, my voice low. “Do you get paid to work here?”

  She pulled out of my grasp then, heading for the door. She was halfway through it when she spoke.

  “No.”