Published at 24th of February 2024 10:31 am

Chapter 14

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The thing about emitters was that they needed to be regularly cleaned out in order to keep them operating at full capacity. A tiny bit of mana crystallized during the emission process, and if no one ever came along and took care of that, it built up until the emitter was useless.

The emitters the Collector had used had not been maintained, probably not ever judging by how much mana was built up inside of them. Since there was already a bunch of mana stuck inside the emitters, it was easy for me to break a bit loose to mix in with the fresh mana my parents had donated. I didn’t bother to do it for Senica’s, and I’d given such a small sliver of mana to mine that it wasn’t worth the effort. For my parents, though, it was a good twenty percent increase over what they’d actually given.

I didn’t know what the threshold was, but I figured that the extra push should probably do it. If not, then I’d handle that problem when it arose. Right now, I had two parents to let in on the scheme and an older sister who needed to be comforted by the knowledge that she hadn’t ruined anything despite her teacher’s attempts to screw us over.

Mother was already hard at work on that last part, so I took the opportunity to snag Father’s attention and beckoned him closer. “What is it?” he asked, leaning down. Then he thought better of it and shook his head. “Sorry, it’s hard to break the habits. I’m trying not to treat you like a little kid.”

“I appreciate that,” I told him. And I did, more than he’d ever realize. It was somehow humiliating and infuriating at the same time to be constantly talked down to by every single person I met. “I wanted to tell you that there’s nothing to worry about.”

“There isn’t? The times aren’t even close, and Ayaka’s known us for years. She knows we’re not fast channelers or whatever.”

“That may be something you have to deal with soon if she brings it up, because I added more mana to each of your emitters. Sorry, the Testing implements.”

Father was silent for a moment as he considered that. Then he asked, “How? I thought you didn’t have much left.”

“You don’t have to actually touch an emitter to manipulate it,” I told him. “Once it was outside of the cloth wrapping, I just scraped loose some of the excess mana that had built up inside. It’ll mix with the mana you gave it and whoever looks at it later on will think it all came from you.”

He gave a short laugh. “The things you know… You’re sure it’ll work?”

“I’m sure that whoever measures it will think you put in about twenty percent more mana than you actually did, you and Mother both. I’m not sure that it’ll meet whatever arbitrary quota they’ve decided on, but I couldn’t realistically give us much more of an edge than that without it becoming suspicious anyway.”

“That’s true,” Father said. He glanced over to where the feminine half of our family was sitting on the pallet and said, “I should tell your mother, but I don’t think Senica is ready to learn all of this yet.”

“No,” I agreed. “She’s too young to have to keep these kinds of secrets.”

We’d been speaking softly, but Mother had still noticed us. She shot Father a questioning glance while Senica nestled deeper into her arms. He tilted his head in my direction and waggled his eyebrows back at her. What passed between them in that silent communication, I could not begin to guess. Whatever it was, she relaxed just slightly.

“This has been quite a stressful night,” Father announced, “But we don’t have to tithe tonight. How about we have dinner, then we can have a quiet night in before bed?”

Maybe I’d get a few more hours of working on my mana crystal done tonight. One bright side about this new arrangement with my parents was that I didn’t need to justify myself or invent excuses to hide what I was doing. They didn’t know the details, but they knew that sitting on that rock was going to help me. As long as I kept up appearances, it was fine if I wanted to sit on that rock well into the evening.

Yes, a quiet night was just what we all needed.

***

I was looking forward to things returning to normal so I could get back to work, but I’d forgotten that Cherok had invited the wrath of my parents down on his head. Father did not leave for the fields with the dawn. Instead, he spent time with Mother and Senica while I sat on my rock in the garden and continued weaving strands of mana through it. Progress was good, especially since I had a full core when I woke up in the morning to devote to the task.

An hour after we’d woken up, the whole family moved as one towards the school. We were early, either because my parents wanted a good long while to yell at Cherok, or because Father could only delay his appearance in the fields for so long. Maybe both. Either way, we were the first people there. Cherok himself was still inside, bleary-eyed and working his way through his own morning rituals.

“We need to have a talk.” My mother announced her presence in an ice-cold tone. Cherok’s back was to the entrance, and he froze as soon as she spoke. When he turned in place and saw both her and Father standing together, his eyes widened, then narrowed in anger.

“Senica, please wait at your seat with Gravin while your father and I speak with your teacher,” she said, her voice only slightly warmer.

“Come on,” Senica said, tugging at my hand and leading me to the back of the one-room building where a dozen chairs were lined up in two rows. “I’ll show you what school is like.”

I was only half-listening to Senica as she pointed out her seat in the front row, or when she showed me the papers she’d practiced her letters on. Idly, I noted that I didn’t recognize most of them despite the language being similar to what I’d spoken in my previous life. That was something to consider later, but it let me know that if nothing else, school would be useful for learning to write the local dialect. It was an oddity, and I enjoyed picking those apart until I had a satisfying explanation.

It was a frivolous use of mana, but Cherok was the most unpleasant person I’d met thus far in this new life, and I wanted to enjoy my parents taking turns tearing into him. It was petty, yes, but what was life without a little fun every now and then?

“What the hell is the matter with you?” Mother hissed from the outside of the building, her voice pitched low enough that Senica couldn’t hear.

“Nothing is the matter with me,” Cherok said. “I have a schedule, and it doesn’t bend to your whims.”

“Is that so? So you just didn’t care that our family’s Testing got moved to last night because that wasn’t on your schedule?”

“Look, Xilaya. Sometimes students lie. You should know all about that, right?”

“Can we not drag up things that happened two decades ago?” Father asked. “I get that you hate us. I’m not even saying you’re wrong. We were kids. It wasn’t on purpose, but I’d take it back if I could. I’m sorry about what happened, but that does not give you the right to take it out on my daughter.”

“You think I give a shit if you’re sorry?” Cherok snarled, his voice rising loud enough that Senica jumped and shot a glance at the entryway. “You think that makes it better? That I forgave you because you were both kids? You were old enough to know better. You just thought you were special and the rules didn’t apply to you, and Teno had to pay the price for that. Take your apology and cram it up your-”

“Enough,” Mother said. “Your issues with us will remain with us. You knew the Testing had been moved and you deliberately reworked your own schedule to force Senica to spend all of her mana yesterday. Were you trying to ensure that we failed, just so we’d have to suffer for a month or two?”

“I have a schedule for all Testings done by any families who have a student in school. Your daughter’s Testing was scheduled for last week. On that day, I exempted her from all mana exercises. Unless a Collector comes and tells me otherwise, I follow the schedule. Kids are always trying to lie to me to get out of doing their school work, and I had no reason to suspect otherwise in this case. If anything, given her family history, I’d assume she was even more inclined to lie than the average student.”

I could actually hear Father’s teeth grinding while Cherok spoke. I did not think of my father as a gentle man, but in the going on nine months that I’d known him, he’d always been patient and kind. Even when he’d taken me out to the fields to see the aftermath of the mana sniffer’s attack, he hadn’t been angry with me. He’d just been firmly insistent that I needed to tell him the truth.

So I was a little bit surprised to hear the smack of skin on skin when Father punched Cherok in the face. I hadn’t thought my old man had it in him.

There was a stunned moment of silence, then Cherok said, “How dare you! You may rest assured that I will be informing the Garrison about this immediately. Get out now, and take your grubby children with you. I’ll look forward to watching you get lashed in the middle of town this evening, Sellis.”

“Kids, come out here. We’re leaving,” Mother said in her normal voice.

I let Senica lead the way. She paused at the door and gasped, but Mother just guided her away from the building. I stepped out into the morning light behind her, saw Cherok wiping away blood from his nose while my father stood five feet away with his fists clenched at his side and a ferocious scowl on his face, and wisely decided that the best place to be right now was not standing between those men.

“You’re an idiot, Sellis, same as when you were a kid,” Cherok said. “I hope this teaches you a lesson. Better late than never.”

“And you never learned when to stop running your mouth,” Father said. “Always so full of yourself, sure that your way was the one and only right way, that anyone who couldn’t see that was too stupid to realize something obvious. After all this time, you haven’t changed a bit. You’re more set in your ways than ever.”

“Well I won’t be the one getting my back torn to ribbons tonight, will I?” the teacher retorted. He gestured across the street, where two women standing thirty feet away were standing next to a hut and watching the exchange silently. “Witnesses. No way to lie your way out of punishment this time. No one else to take the fall for you.”

“True enough,” Father admitted. “Better make sure it’s worth it then?”

“What?” Cherok asked, right before Father took a step forward and popped him in the mouth.

“I loved Teno like a brother. His death is the biggest regret of my life. I never meant for something like that to happen.”

“It should have been you then,” Cherok said, revealing bloody teeth. “If you’d had any decency, it would have been.”

“On that we can agree. I don’t expect you to forgive me, but you damn well better treat my children fairly. None of what happened then was their fault, and if you think you’re going to abuse them to get back at me, well, next time I won’t use my fists. Run along now, you’ll want to get over to the barracks before the blood dries.”

Giving us one last hate-filled glare, Cherok turned his back and scurried off down the street. Father watched him go, then sighed and glanced down at me. “That could have gone better,” he said.

Wordlessly, I nodded my agreement.

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