Chapter 16
Provisional
There were twelve of them.
He counted at the orientation â€" twelve provisional students arranged in
the eastern lecture hall at the sixth bell, most of them looking like
they'd rather be somewhere else. The hall was designed to hold two
hundred. The twelve of them rattled around in it like loose change.
Cyan took a seat near the back and assessed.
Three of them were clearly guild-sponsored â€" he recognized the type, the
same careful watchfulness he'd developed himself, the habit of sitting
with your back toward a wall. Two of those three had Bronze-rank badges,
which made them the most conventionally qualified people in the room.
Four were noble-adjacent â€" not from the great houses, those students
went straight to General Cohort, but from minor houses or merchant
families with enough political connection to get a provisional slot.
Anxious in a specific way, the way people were anxious when they had
something to lose.
Two were young. Fifteen at most, which was early for Academy admission
and usually meant something unusual about their ability profile.
One was older â€" mid-twenties, which was late, which also usually meant
something.
One was a girl about his age sitting in the third row with her arms
crossed and her eyes on the door, like she was calculating the distance
to the exit.
And one was Cyan.
The orientation was run by a junior faculty member who delivered the
information in the tone of someone reading from a document they'd
memorized and found tedious. The rules were straightforward: provisional
students attended all mandatory classes alongside general cohort, were
evaluated at semester's end on a pass-fail basis, had no rank
advancement privileges until passing evaluation, and ate after everyone
else.
That last one wasn't in the official documentation. The junior faculty
member mentioned it as an afterthought, the way you mentioned something
that was technically policy but mostly just custom. Cyan noted it and
moved on.
The practical information was more useful. Schedule, building locations,
library access â€" restricted for provisional students, full access after
passing evaluation â€" practice hall availability, and the process for
filing grievances, which the faculty member described in a way that made
it sound like nobody had ever successfully used it.
After the orientation, most of the provisionals clustered in small
groups outside the hall. Cyan didn't cluster. He walked to the dormitory
to check if his roommate had arrived.
He hadn't. The bag on the other bunk was still the only evidence of
another person.
He sat at the desk and looked at his schedule. First classes started
tomorrow. Mana Theory was mandatory for all students â€" that would put
him in a room with General Cohort. Combat Assessment was
provisional-only for the first month. Dungeon Studies was general.
History of the Saints was general.
History of the Saints. He'd see what they taught about that.
A knock at the door. He said come in.
The girl from the orientation â€" arms-crossed, watching-the-exit â€" leaned
in the doorway. She had short dark hair and the particular expression of
someone who had decided to do something practical and was executing on
it.
'You're the null result,' she said.
It wasn't a question. His provisional badge had a small notation on it
that indicated his Runestone result category. Apparently she'd looked.
'You're in this dormitory,' he said.
'Room four. Down the hall.' She studied him with the directness of
someone who didn't have time for approaches. 'I'm Fen. I'm also a null
result, officially, though mine is more complicated. I want to know
about yours.'
Cyan looked at her.
'I'm not interested in being friends,' she said. 'I'm interested in
surviving the semester. Two null results is unusual and unusual things
at the Academy tend to either be very useful or very dangerous and I'd
like to know which one this is before it becomes relevant.'
He thought about that for a moment.
'Sit down,' he said.
She came in and sat on the edge of the other bunk.
He didn't tell her about the Mark. Not yet. But he listened to what she
said about herself, and he filed it, and he thought that whatever
complicated meant in this context, it was probably worth knowing.