Asher smiles warmly. "I'm sure I will!" they say. "I'm looking forward to seeing everything in the daylight."
From somewhere downstairs, a gong rings, and then again. It's breakfast time. You head down, and bump into Beaumont and Dominique leaving the building. In daylight, Beaumont's eyes are shadowed with tiredness, but they move quickly. They nod to you briskly, then lead you outside.
Dominique trails behind them, yawning. Unlike Beaumont, who looks the picture of neatness in their carefully put-together shirt and pants, Dominique's shirt is only partially tucked into his gray culottes.
You step into the cool open air and follow the chattering crowd of students to a vast hall. Some students are as young as your brother Oliver; they're uncertain and wide-eyed, looking like they wouldn't say boo to a goose. The eighteen-year-old final-years like you stride around with an air of familiar certainty. While Beaumont and Dominique argue over who woke up whom in the morning, you file in.
Next
The dining hall is vastly baroque. Gilded buttresses soar above you, sparkling in the warm light, and lovingly painted frescoes spread across the ceiling, depicting mythological scenes. One entire wall is dominated by a painstakingly elaborate stained glass window showing a series of youths holding mythical objects; one crowned young man you recognize as your very distant ancestor, King Elias, looking radiant while bearing the diamond globe of Voigt.
He looks something like you. If you were standing on a cloud staring beatifically at the sky, that is.
More important right now is the matter of food. A gorgeous spread is served in an arrangement that feels more like a meal at a grand ball than at a school. Sitting at a long banquet table with Dominique and Beaumont, you watch as Pascal Haberlin ascends an ornate platform that could be part of a theater stage.
Next
We welcome you all to a new year at Archambault!" booms Pascal from the lectern. "And may I take the opportunity to welcome again our newest student, His Highness Prince Irad Motahhari! How marvelous to bring yet another royal connection to our Academy walls, after Prince Rosario's successful study here!"
Wild applause thunders through the hall.
Despite your efforts, you stick out of the crowd as if you were seven feet tall. Everyone turns to stare at you, and as the chatter rises once more, there's a buzz of urgency in the air. A cluster of students contrive to pass your table to gawk, while even the older ones turn to stare at you and whisper amongst themselves while they watch.
Beaumont looks as unimpressed with the whole thing as they did last night. They flick through a sheaf of papers while drinking a prodigious amount of coffee with their croissants, looking the picture of a businessperson in their office. Dominique leans on his elbow while he eats his cereal.
"I can't believe you're here," he says. "You look like you should be in the palace! Not like the rest of us at all!"
Dominique looks chastened, and as he finishes his cereal, he turns to Beaumont. "What's the first lesson?" he says in an evident effort to change the subject.
"You need to figure out your timetable," Beaumont says without looking up. "It's Natural Science, with Vere Serafin."
"Oh, no," Dominique says dolefully.
You look up to follow Dominique's gaze to the teachers' table, and see a hawk-faced woman in her middle age dressed in a smart, if dour, charcoal-gray suit. She's frowning at a couple of the other teachers, and gestures with her fork for emphasis as she speaks. As you watch, she signals to a servant, who rings a bell to mark five minutes left of breakfast.
Soon, it's time to go. Your first lesson awaits.
Next
Today, Natural Science takes place in the laboratories situated in the Schneider Tower. Lady Vere Serafin ushers you in, along with Beaumont and Dominique; you sit upon tall stools. The knots on the desks have been worn smooth and shiny with age, but the inkwells are brand new.
There are other final-year students attending the Academy, but the tiny class size is one of the points boasted about in the prospectus; the idea is that students get plenty of personalized attention from the teachers. In practice, it feels odd to be in such a spacious room with only two other students.
"Welcome to Natural Science," Vere says. "I believe the final member of this class is due later, but there's no need to dawdle. Let's start with something simple."
She details the chemistry experiment you are to perform in pairs, and then gestures to two sets of equipment.
"Prince Irad Motahhari, please decide who to work with," she says.
Dominique edges his stool closer to you.
"Can I go with you?" he whispers. "Beaumont's so grouchy whenever I work with them."
"Absolutely," you whisper to Dominique, and he grins in delight.
While Beaumont quietly sets up the test tubes under Vere's scrutiny, you and Dominique settle at your station. It's a reactivity test for the small samples of metal; you are to place the metals in tubes of acid of variable strengths, record their reactions, put them in order, and estimate what they are as a result.
Dominique loosens his tie restlessly, then puts on a pair of goggles. "I hope you know what you're doing," he says. "I can't remember anything from before the summer. Did you hear that the Honorable Florin Kraemer's been sent overseas with the military?"
You strongly suspect that if Dominique is left to his own devices, he will at best be a distraction and at worst disrupt the lesson altogether. That, of course, may jeopardize your reputation with Vere.
Dominique's shoulders slump. "It's hard to, when there's so few people around," he mutters. "It's far too quiet in here to think."
But with your example and instructions, you keep him in line. Over the lesson, you gather plenty of results in your notebook.
Next
With ten minutes to go before the bell, Dominique pauses. "What's that one meant to be?" he says, pointing with his tweezers at the final sample. "You should do it. It's probably the most reactive. I don't want to drop it!"
A small sample of slightly shiny metal sits upon the desk in front of you. You carefully lift it with your tweezers.