—
The term passed so quickly that Arram hardly noticed when the cold weather set in and the rains followed. He did realize that for the first Midwinter festivities since his arrival at the university, he had friends to share the holiday and gifts with him. Instead of spending long days and nights reading on his cot, he was welcomed to parties by Varice and those who wanted to stay friends with her and Ozorne. The prince even got to join them on the fourth day of the holiday, the longest night of the year. In his honor the emperor presented the Lower Academy with a fabulous breakfast of fruits, eggs, meat, fresh breads, and cheeses to mark the return of the sun. Afterward, everyone waddled to their beds for a long sleep before the evening’s parties.
“This is far better,” Ozorne told Arram between yawns as they staggered into their cubicles. “Mother didn’t like me spending so much time only with a girl the last couple of years, so she’d drag me to the palace every night of the holiday. I’d have to be polite to every stiff statue in court, even though they can’t be bothered to remember my name. Now that we’re friends, though, Mother isn’t clutching me so tightly.” He cleared his throat. “I may have mentioned that you like Varice.”
“Well, of course I do!” Arram replied, startled. “You two are the best friends…” He looked at Ozorne’s grin and realized his friend meant a different kind of liking. That wouldn’t do—Ozorne would tease him mercilessly if he believed Arram had feelings for their friend. “Ozorne! I don’t think of her like that!” he lied. “She doesn’t think of me like that!”
Ozorne wandered into his cubicle, shedding his long tunic. The beads rattled in his hair as he pulled on his nightshirt. “So sensitive,” he joked.
Arram made a rude noise and retired to his own cubicle to change into his night gear. He was drifting off when he said, “I thought you liked Varice.”
Ozorne responded with a yawn, then said, “We already have it worked out. It will be years and years before any of us have learned enough magic to make us happy. By then I will have gotten the emperor’s permission to set up as a mage on my own, perhaps in the central mountains. I could represent him there. Varice has agreed to be my housekeeper and hostess, and if you like, you can work with me as well. We’ll keep the emperor’s peace, study new plants, volcanoes, and waterfalls the size of entire towns, and no one will bother us. What do you say?”
“Sounds glorious,” Arram mumbled, then slept.
He was riding a log like a horse, bouncing along huge, roaring waves. Ahead of him the river thundered like the god’s greatest wrath. It was exciting; it felt strange; he was scared to tumble into what had to be waterfalls ahead. One more bounce as the log dropped off the top of a wave—
He woke on his belly. Outside his shuttered window he could hear the roar of pouring rain. “So that’s what it is,” he muttered, and dropped his face into his pillow.
His male organ was pinching him somehow. He turned to the side. That at least took his weight off of it, but it still didn’t feel quite right. He squirmed, but the feeling remained.
He touched his organ and flinched. It was not its usual relaxed and floppy self. “Stop it!” he ordered softly, wondering if someone had bespelled him, or if he was going to die. There was no change in his body’s new state.
He tried to hear if Ozorne was awake, but the rain drowned out his roommate’s light snore. Arram clutched his covers around himself and addressed prayers to a number of gods. At last his midsection began to feel as it usually did. When he took another peek, the member was back to normal. He silently thanked whichever god had intervened.
He heard a thump on the other side of the wall. Ozorne was up.
“You’d best not be lolling about in bed,” his friend called. “It’s the first day of the new term. The sun returns, or at least Great Mithros is planning to, and the Crone also considers loosening her grip. We can hope for warmth instead of freezing in class.”
Through all this Arram could hear his friend clothing himself. He cautiously rose and did the same, checking his member repeatedly. It remained in its proper position, as still as a post. Perhaps “post” was not the way to think of it, he realized, considering its earlier behavior.
For a moment he considered asking Ozorne about it, then rejected the idea in panic. He knew of older boys and men who were considered to be zoeg in Thak, or a couple in Common, but he also knew plenty of boys who turned nasty when they thought another boy might be interested in them physically. More than once he’d seen one boy viciously attack another when it was suggested. He didn’t want to risk it, and he didn’t want to risk the friendship. Better to find a book about it, perhaps in the Library of Medicine, or suck up his courage and see a healer. And perhaps it would never happen again.
—
The term rushed along. For a time his member behaved itself, enough that Arram forgot its unusual act. He had other things on his mind. At lunch on the first day of the spring term Master Cosmas called Arram out of the room and gave him a square of parchment. “Arram, I’ve made a bit of a change to your schedule. One of Master Lindhall’s assistants will instruct you in fish and shellfish anatomy during the time when you formerly learned sigils. This is where you will find the workroom.”
“Yes, Master,” Arram murmured, reading the paper.
“You’ll continue your study of sigils in your class on the written word and writing technique in the afternoon. Both your masters feel that you have made enough progress to manage the combination.”
Arram nodded, fingering the paper. Fish and shellfish meant more cutting dead animals up, as he did with birds and lizards, and drawing their insides. It was interesting in a peculiar way.
“Is something wrong?” Master Cosmas asked, his bright blue eyes worried. “Have I loaded you with too much? Several of your masters say you are outpacing what they planned for you this term.”
Arram smiled at the kind older man. Cosmas often checked to see how he was doing, slipping Arram a handful of sweets or an interesting book in addition. “No, sir, I’ll be fine. I’m twelve now, you know.”
Cosmas’s eyes danced. As head of the school, he had access to Arram’s records. He knew Arram’s true age, but he never let on that he did. “I believe I gave you a birthday present at the time,” he replied seriously. “But you appear concerned.”
“Oh, I was only thinking that Varice will fuss over me working with fish and shellfish. She’ll make me change clothes before supper, probably.”